Corvus et Serpensia
by Neshomeh
Summary: The dark is rising, tainting life, friendship, and love as it spreads to Hogwarts. This story concerns Severus Snape and the first rise of Voldemort. It is an intermediate draft, so constructive criticism is greatly appreciated. In progress: 12 of ?
1. Prologue: Argo's Children

**Disclaimers: **This is the obligatory disclaimer/author notes section. I despise them both, so I'm only doing this once. I'll try to keep it short. 

The disclaimer can be summed up like this: If it belongs to someone else, it's not mine. However, if it belongs to me, then it's no one else's.

Most people, places and things belong to J. K. Rowling, and since it's fanfic she probably has rights to everything here anyway.

Most of the plot is based on Neopets-based role-plays between myself, sevvysnape (now espiritumuerto), and queenalgloria, known respectively on as Sevvy Snape and Adele Elisabeth. I was involved in only a small percentage of the total sessions, I think, so I've also referenced the fan fictions by Sevvy and Adele, respectively "Irony of Living" and "Once Upon a Time." (Go read them when you're done here. It's fun.) The character Morganna Montaque, as well as several minor characters mentioned in context with her, belong to Adele. Though Severus Snape belongs to J. K. Rowling, I really have to give Sevvy credit for his insight. Without him, I would never have stopped to really look at Severus, who is such a complex and wonderful character. There are some characters mentioned in context with Severus that belong to Sevvy.

Any other people's characters and/or works belong to their respective owners.

The rest belongs to me. I will defend my claim to Jennifer Robinson and her family with my life. Touch them without permission from me and suffer my wrath. The rest I'm not quite so touchy about. I did invent the Bottling Charm and the ensuing chaos. Silvanus Trovillion is mine. I suppose Sylvia Blackridge is mine, though she comes from a passing mention in Sevvy's fic. That's about it.

**Author's Notes:** I'm writing this because, though my character's part in this particular story was small, she DID have a part, and I'd like to showcase that part. I am also doing this to tie together the perspectives of Adele, Sevvy, and myself into one cohesive story that also takes the canon as written by J. K. Rowling into account. I see it as a challenge to my ability to justify anything remotely plausible with the canon, and this qualifies as such. I love constructive criticism, so bring it on. I like a little adulation, too. Flames (if any) will be Bottled and saved for BadFic writers who really deserve it. Anybody who spots the various subtle puns, ironies, and jokes I'm likely to throw in here can feel clever and special, as some of them are pretty obscure. Now, as this part is QUITE long enough and should really be on its own page, enjoy the story, or not. It's your choice.

**Corvus et Serpensia**

(The Raven and the Serpents)

**Prologue – Argo's Children**

Jenni and Ame Robinson were conspicuous simply by being together, so they had to be extra-careful when crossing the barrier to Platform 9¾ at King's Cross Station in London. They shared the same forest green eyes and milk chocolate colored hair, were exactly the same height, and had exactly the same build and facial structure. They were twins, the only things setting them immediately apart being the clothes they wore and the fact that Jenni's hair fell to the bottom of her shoulder blades while Ame kept hers level with her jawline. They had both been accepted to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that year, and they stood with their trunks and other baggage just before the barrier to say farewell to their mother. She was what was called a Muggle and couldn't cross through with her girls to see them safely on the train. That was up to Argo Robinson, their wizard father.

Argo was a tall man with dark hair, olive skin, and gray eyes that watched the good-byes with guarded affection. He felt a momentary wave of regret for Nora-Louise, his wife, who could never fully be a part of the wizarding world. It was at least partly for her sake that he had insisted the girls be raised as Muggles until it was known, one way or the other, that they were magical or not. "That way," he had explained, "it won't be such a shock and a let-down if they're not." He also pointed out that it would be good for magic-Muggle relations if they were raised to have an appreciation and understanding of both worlds, especially in the dreaded case that one twin was magical and the other was not. But in his opinion, things couldn't have worked out better than they had. Both of his children had the gift, and here they were, ready to start their first year at Hogwarts!

Argo himself was happy to be back in his native Britain. America was his wife's motherland and nice enough, but he had never quite felt that he belonged there. Nora was taking the whole thing very well, he noted with pride. She was not crying, though it must be hard to let go after eleven years; neither was she overly brusque in order to mask her feelings. Yet, it was time to go.

"All right, come now," he said as warmly as he could, speaking both to the twins and their mother. "It's only nine months, and we'll see each other at Christmas." This wasn't an option. They had discussed it thoroughly and for this first year, at least, they were not to stay at the school or go off with friends for the holiday. Neither the girls nor their mother could fathom why they would, but Argo could.

Nora shot him a look that clearly told him he had no idea how long nine months could be, but she broke off her string of last-minute admonitions and stood up, smiling fondly at Jenni and Ame.

"Go on, now. Do as your father says," she told them. "You'll have a great time! And if you need anything, just write home. Remember the owls!"

"Give your mother a hug and kiss goodbye," Argo directed them.

They did so in perfect unison, grateful for direction on this singularly bemusing day of their lives. Nora received them gladly, then gave each girl a push toward the barrier.

"You don't want to be late for the train," she told them as they each took hold of their respective trolleys and edged toward the brick partition. "Be good. I love you!" She raised her hand briefly in farewell, a gesture returned by Jenni and Ame before she turned away and pretended typical Muggle ignorance as planned.

Argo gave Nora's shoulder a reassuring squeeze and then followed after the girls, kneeling between them so he could speak quietly into their ears. They glanced nervously between the barrier and their father.

"It's not as difficult as it might seem," he said, his voice full of pride. "All you have to do is—" he made a thrusting gesture with his hand— "walk through. The trick is to keep _them_ from noticing." He gestured at the milling Muggles.

"Right." Jenni, who was on his left, nodded, her hands tightening around the handle bar of her trolley. She moistened her lips and narrowed her eyes at the barrier wall, sizing it up and challenging it. _Go on… I dare you to be a real wall._

Argo couldn't help but grin.

"All right, Jen, you go first. Ready? Go for it!"

She did. At a fast trot, she charged the wall. Argo watched her tense up at the last second in preparation for a collision—which never came! One second she was there, the next she was not. The passers-by didn't even blink.

"Now, your turn," Argo said to Ame. "I want to show you a different way. On a busy day like this it's fine to run at it, but there will be days you'll have to take it slow to avoid attracting attention. Push your cart up against the wall, like this—there. Now, I'll lean on the wall and you lean on the cart. We just stand here talking like this and very… slowly… lean… our way through. Here we are!"

So they were! Ame grinned, then looked around for her twin. Jenni saw her first, though, and came bounding over to talk excitedly to her.

"Isn't this place great?" she enthused.

"It's amazing," breathed Ame, looking around avidly at the menagerie of interesting people and things.

Argo smiled, reminiscing about the day he had entered Platform 9¾ for the first time. Things weren't so different now from what they were then. There was the gleaming scarlet Hogwarts Express, just as magnificent as ever. The sign proclaimed that this was indeed the impossible platform. All around them flowed a colorful current of wizards and witches with their children, their children's pets, and their children's things. The din of conversation added to the wonderful sense of chaos that permeated the air, the level of which suggested to Argo that the train would leave very soon. Jenni and Ame were still talking and were unaware, so Argo stepped in.

"All right girls, you'll have time to get adjusted later. You don't want to miss the train!" he reminded them.

As if on cue, a steamy whistle sounded over the cacophony on the platform. A conductor cried, "All aboard for Hogwarts!" and the people milling about suddenly (some of them literally) dropped what they were doing and made for the train, luggage in tow.

"What did I tell you? This is it! Hop it, hop it!" Argo urged, making propelling gestures with his arms.

"I love you both! Have a good year!" he called as Jenni and Ame dragged their trunks onto one of the gleaming cars (with some help from a steward). Argo watched until he saw their faces appear in one of the windows and smiled encouragement at them. They smiled and waved back to him, Jenni jostling playfully for space and Ame trying hard to keep her father in view. Then the whistle blew again, the conductor called out for the last time, a steam vent hissed, and the first slow _puff_, _puffs_ from the smokestack had the train moving at a snail's pace out of King's Cross Station.

Argo waved until the last car was out, then relaxed and took a step back. His children were finally off to Hogwarts. He had never really doubted they would go, but it was a joy to see it happen! There was a certain significance to this day that he wanted to savor for the rest of his life. His children, his twins, were witches.

_This meant something, of course, but something deeper than he could fathom. As a father, he was certain his children had important roles to fill in life, but what those roles were, he couldn't guess. Neither could Ame and I know that we would be involved in some of the most important years the wizarding community had ever seen, nor that we would be accepted into the circles of some of the most important people to those times._


	2. Part One: Serpens aut Corvus?

**Part One – Serpens aut Corvus?**

Jenni and Ame waved at their father until they were out of sight of the train station and hadn't been able to see him for half a minute. Only then did they turn around to see that they were sharing the compartment with two other people, a boy and a girl.

"Hullo," Jenni said with mild surprise as she sat down. She smiled when she regained her composure. "Are you first years, too?"

"Third year, actually," said the boy. He was rather tall and gangly with a mess of dark brown hair and a narrow face. He extended his hand to Jenni and Ame in turn.

"My name's Frank, Frank Longbottom. And you?"

"Jennifer Robinson," she told him, returning his warm handshake. "And this is my sister, Ame."

"I could see that," he grinned.

"Hi," Ame said quietly. She was watching the girl, who had long, dark, straight hair and light hazel eyes, and was watching the Robinsons intently through them. Jenni thought the irony of a watcher being watched was amusing, but her sister was thinking deeper thoughts.

"What's your name?" Ame asked her.

"Sylvia Blackridge," she replied, a friendly smile brightening her features as soon as she was acknowledged. "This is my first year, too. It's nice to meet you all." She shook everyone's hand.

"I'm surrounded by babies!" Frank joked.

He, Sylvia and Jenni fell to talking for the rest of the trip. Ame simply sat back in her seat with a smile on her face, content to listen. When the trolley came around, Frank treated everyone to a Chocolate Frog and a bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans each. Jenni thought that this was a very good start to a new life.

Then it started to rain.

"I feel bad for you firsties," Frank told the girls, grinning as they disembarked from the Hogwarts Express.

It was raining buckets by this time. The sky was so overcast it was almost black, lit occasionally by a jagged stab of lightning that appeared as a white-hot gash in the hide of a roaring beast.

"How's you getting wet any different from us getting wet?" Sylvia asked.

"Well, I'm not getting wet, am I?" said Frank. "The trip across the lake is going to be _awful!"_ he added gleefully as he started to walk away.

"Lake?" Ame said nervously.

"What lake?" Jenni finished excitedly.

"Tell us?" Sylvia pressed.

Frank only grinned and continued to walk backwards.

"See you at the castle!" he called to them, then turned to meet another boy. They disappeared from sight. The three girls stood a-gape, exchanging glances that contained various degrees of nervousness and excitement.

Before anyone could say "now what," a loud voice boomed over the sounds of the storm.

"Firs' years, this way! Don' bother with yer trunks, they'll be taken care of. Firs' years, o'er here!"

Jenni, along with Ame, Sylvia, and a gaggle of other nervous kids, turned to see a gigantic man with a lantern beckoning them his way. Slowly, they gathered around him.

"'Zis everyone?" the man asked, peering easily over them and up and down the small platform. He grunted in a satisfied way and beckoned them on again. "Righ'. This way."

They followed him, or specifically the lantern he bore, wordlessly into the rain. Their way was dark and eerie, lit only by the occasional flashes of lightning and made more treacherous by the mud under their feet. Jenni thought that everyone must have come close to sliding down the narrow path at least once. No one had the slightest idea where they were going until they saw the groundskeeper's lantern reflected by the inky waters of a wide lake. So, Jenni thought, this was the lake. Tethered to the shore were several small boats, all of which lacked oars. Some of those from all-Muggle families exchanged nervous glances with the others.

"No more'n four to a boat now. In ye get," the groundskeeper urged, sounding just as eager to get out of the rain as the students. "I dunno if ye ken see in this, but 'Ogwarts is just o'er there."

He gestured with his lantern and Jenni looked as she clambered into a boat after Ame, Sylvia, and a fourth girl. It was hard to be sure, but she thought she could see hundreds of yellow windows glimmering invitingly in the distance. She hoped the lake wasn't as wide as it seemed. She was about to find out.

From a boat all to himself—he needed the whole thing—the groundskeeper commanded all of them forward and they glided across the wind-tossed water. It was a rough trip. Jenni later reflected that it was probably good that they were already soaked to the bone, for one of the boats nearly capsized when they were halfway across. Thanks to the able groundskeeper, no one fell in and there were no further incidents until they reached Hogwarts proper.

The boats passed through a cave mouth and everyone de-shipped in the natural boathouse the cavern formed. Jenni and Ame trudged hand in hand up the path to the castle with the rest of the sopping first years, right up to the humongous front doors. They could have been built to the proportions of a giant. The groundskeeper, for example. He walked up to them and ceremoniously banged the knocker three times. Jenni winced as Ame squeezed her hand, then squeezed reassuringly back. They were both nervous and excited. They had been waiting for this day ever since their father told them about the wizarding world for the first time, when they turned eleven last June.

At long last, the solid, heavy doors swung open with regal slowness, creaking and moaning like a ghoul. Suddenly, Jenni's past flashed before her eyes and she understood with profound certainty that her old life was over and a new one was about to begin. It was an odd, ominous feeling and she was not certain what it meant. She decided it didn't matter just then.

Finally, the doors were perpendicular to the wall. A young-looking witch with black hair and an uncompromising glance thanked the groundskeeper, Hagrid, and informed him (and the rapt first years) that she would take the students from there. It was then, as she led the quivering group of cold, wet kids into the gigantic entrance hall, that they had their first encounter with Peeves, who simply couldn't resist pelting them with orange water-balloons filled with ice-cold sherbet.

"_Peeves!"_ the witch bellowed as the poltergeist cackled with mad glee and dropped his freezing cold bombs on them.

"Ickle firsties!" he taunted. "Lookit 'em squirm!"

Jenni and Ame indeed ducked to one side to avoid a balloon that just barely missed their shoes. Ame yelped as it splashed over the stone floor.

"I'm warning you, Peeves," the witch threatened, her finger waving dangerously. "I know a ghost who would be mighty displeased to hear of your behavior!"

Peeves did not seem to want to answer to whoever this was.

"Just having a spot of fun," he pouted, but he wasn't about to leave without a grand finale, either. "I scream, you scream," he chanted; "we ALL scream!" And he swooped low over the heads of the students, dropped his last balloon on an unsuspecting boy, and whisked away, laughing at the cries and startled expressions that followed.

The witch muttered angrily to herself and ushered them into an out-of-the-way side room. She told them to wait there until she had come back and then escorted the traumatized lad off to get a change of robes. When she returned a few minutes later, she still looked slightly put-out, but also fully in command of the situation.

"Right. Welcome to Hogwarts," she said, sounding as if she was trying to stick to the script. Jenni and a few other people laughed quietly at the irony of it, but the witch glared sternly at them and they all fell silent.

"I am Professor McGonagall, one of your teachers this year. In a moment, we will all go into the Great Hall and you will see the people you will be spending the majority of the next few years of your life with. However, before you join the rest of the student body you must be Sorted, each into one of the four Hogwarts Houses. They are Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin. The Sorting is probably the most important ceremony we have here because your House will be something like an extended family to you while you are at school. You will take classes with the other members of your House. You will eat with them, share a dormitory with them, and spend the majority of your free time in your House common room. Now…." Professor McGonagall lifted her arm and pushed back the sleeve of her robes to look at what was for all intents and purposes a watch. What she could see reminded Jenni of the device on the cover of one of her father's books, The Golden Compass. It had all sorts of pictures and numbers arrayed around its circumference and many hands pointing to them.

"Yes, they're ready for you now," Professor McGonagall informed the students. "Form a line and come along."

That they did, and were led across the wide entrance hall and through a gigantic pair of gold-plated double-doors into the Great Hall.

On either side of Jenni, Ame and Sylvia drew breath at the sight of it. It was truly grand and beautiful. Jenni was entranced by the colors. Four long tables were evenly spaced, set with golden plates, goblets, and flatware. Each had its own colors. The one on the far left was all in green and silver. The next over was draped in dark blue and bronze. The middle-right one was decorated yellow and white, and the table on the far right was all in scarlet and gold. _These must be the House tables,_ Jenni thought, and smiled to herself. If the colors had anything to do with it, she could guess where she and Ame would go. Ame would certainly be placed at the third table, whose colors were of mellowness and honesty as far as Jenni was concerned. As for herself… that was harder. She ruled out the yellow and the red, but it remained a toss-up between green and blue. _The problem with green,_ she mused, _is that certain shades can be taken to mean so many things._ One shade was her favorite color (closely followed by just that dark blue), but another shade was the putrid green of poison. This one was right in between the two.

Then her eyes wandered around the rest of the Hall, taking it in from bottom to top. The flagstone floor wasn't particularly interesting, but the hundreds of candles floating in midair were. More intriguing were the luminous, silvery beings that she identified as ghosts (none of whom was Peeves, she realized happily). There was a fifth table set on a raised platform perpendicular to the other four, and on the wall behind it hung five banners. Centered was the large representation of the Hogwarts crest, which was comprised of a letter H surrounded by a serpent, a raven, a badger, and a lion, each set in its respective color quadrant. On either side were the individual banners of the Houses: Green and blue on the left, yellow and red on the right. Looking all the way up, Jenni saw the ceiling.

"It's enchanted," breathed Sylvia, who was also gazing heavenward.

"It would have to be," Jenni answered. It looked exactly like the sky outside, yet no rain fell on their upturned faces and it was pleasantly warm in the Hall. What a great bit of magic!

Movement drew Jenni's eyes back down again. Professor McGonagall brought out a three-legged stool and placed a battered old wizard's hat on top of it. Jenni saw that the hat was patched, frayed, and dirty from years of use, yet she wondered how long it had been sitting in someone's closet. Then something strange happened. A tear at the seam of the hat's brim opened up like a mouth, and it began to sing.

_The Hogwarts Sorting Hat am I,  
A proper name I lack.  
Yet placing students properly,  
For that I have a knack.  
I may not be the prettiest  
Not top hat or bonnet,  
But, you see, I am composing!  
(At least it's not a sonnet.)  
So now that you're sure I'm clever,  
Know I'm trustworthy, too.  
So put me on and we will see  
Which House is right for you!  
You might belong in Gryffindor,  
Where the bravest win renown.  
The lion-hearted Gryffindor  
Won't stand to be held down.  
Or perhaps to Ravenclaw  
Will you be suited best.  
The quick and witty students there  
Show wisdom manifest.  
Some to loyal Hufflepuff  
Will find that they belong.  
An open-hearted Hufflepuff,  
In sense of duty strong.  
The rest may find that Slytherin  
Will be their home this while.  
They are a determined lot,  
And not too shy for guile.  
One of four is right for you,  
Of this please rest assured.  
So set me now atop your head  
And hear the final word!_

As the song ended, amidst scattered applause from the staff and students, Professor McGonagall stepped forward and unrolled a long scroll of parchment.

"When I call your name, you will come forward, put on the hat, and sit on the stool to be Sorted," she told the first years. "Ashworth, Caleb!"

The boy, who had light blond hair and gray eyes, did his best to look dignified as he walked up to the stool and took a seat, placing the worn hat over his head—and indeed, over his eyes. Almost right away, the hat shouted:

"GRYFFNDOR!"

The table on the far right burst into applause as Caleb joined them.

"Bailey, Kerry!"

This was the fourth girl who had ridden in the boat with Ame, Sylvia and Jenni on the way across the lake. She looked nervous but excited as she sat.

"GRYFFNDOR!"

Her face broke into a wide grin and she walked briskly to join the red table.

"Barker, Benjamin!"

"SLYTHERN!"

"Bishop, Sassy!"

"SLYTHERN!"

It was the far-left table that cheered for these two. Well, most of them cheered. Jenni noted that some of them looked particularly indifferent. Then there were only a couple of B-names before—

"Blackridge, Sylvia!"

The dark-haired girl gave me a nervous smile before making her way to the stool. Her eyes vanished under the hat, and a few moments later—

"RAVENCLAW!"

The near-left table welcomed her enthusiastically into their ranks and she looked greatly relieved. Jenni smiled and waved at her from the line, but returned her attention to the Sorting at a stern look from McGonagall.

"Caulder, Emily!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!" declared the hat.

"Devendorf, Gregory!"

"SLYTHERN!"

Jenni lost interest and her mind wandered all the way through "Lyon, Amber" ("GRYFFNDOR!"). Green or blue for her? She still wasn't sure. She was beginning to dislike the look of the majority of the Slytherins, who seemed rather mean, but she thought the Ravenclaws seemed aloof. Then she shook herself. She was being pessimistic, looking only at the negative side of each. While she was at it, she might point out to herself that the House Ame would surely join was comprised of a bunch of sticks-in-the-mud and the Gryffindors appeared very arrogant. She knew better than to look at things that superficially! She would just have to wait and see what happened.

"Miller, Melody" and "Moon, Gideon" went to Hufflepuff. Then "Nash, Jane" joined the Ravenclaws along with "Prior, Samuel." "River, Aeryn" went to Gryffindor, and then—

"Robinson, Ame!"

Ame blanched and looked pleadingly at her sister, but Jenni could only smile and shake her head. She wished that Ame didn't have to go first, but such were the evils of alphabetical order. She gave her twin a reassuring nudge and Ame walked up to the stool. Jenni could see that she was quivering with nerves even as she sat down and placed the hat on her head. The seconds crawled by as she leaned forward, anxious for the result even though she was sure of what it would be. To the rest of the room, it lasted mere moments, but to Jenni it was a small fragment of eternity. Then the hat called out once again.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

In unison, the twins sighed and sagged in relief. Ame took the hat off and stood up to the cheers from the Hufflepuff table. She smiled triumphantly at Jenni, who beamed back at her. Then one of the most important moments of Jenni's life was upon her.

"Robinson, Jennifer!"

All the noise in the Great Hall seemed to fade away until all she could hear were the sounds of her shoes thwupping against the flagstone floor and her deep breathing as she approached the stool. Green or blue? She would soon know. She sat down and let the hat slide down over her eyes and the sounds of the Hall truly did die away.

"Another one, eh? Not much like your sister, though, are you?" said a voice.

_Huh?_ Jenni thought, admittedly too startled to speak aloud. The voice chuckled.

"Honest with ourselves, are we? That's a good Hufflepuff quality, but you're very different from your sister indeed."

She knew that already. Could the hat actually read her thoughts? Then it ought to know she knew it was—

"Either Ravenclaw or Slytherin for you," the hat finished with her. "But which? You're a puzzle, but let me see. Hm, not a bad mind at all. You're a good thinker, but easily distracted. Your mind works in devious ways. Ah, you'll go to great lengths to achieve your ends. Determined and stubborn! Yet, that intensity may be tempered by a logically constructed set of morals, based on reason. I see now, yes, yes indeed. The place you'll flourish is none other than RAVENCLAW!"

That was it? Jenni sat stunned for a moment. For some reason, she felt there should be more to it.

"There's far more to it than you can guess right now," the hat told her sagely. "Now go on, scoot off. Others still to Sort, you know."

Jenni shook herself back to the present. Yes, of course there were more left. Just because she was done didn't mean the thing was over. She stood up and took the hat off. Instantly, the sounds of the Hall came flooding back to her. Looking around as she set the hat back on the stool, she saw Professor McGonagall gesturing impatiently for her to get a move on and the whole of the blue-draped table on their feet cheering for her. She grinned with sudden pride and went to join them as "Tempscire, Marguerite" was called up to be Sorted. She was a Ravenclaw, and for as long as she was at Hogwarts, even after, she would strive to live up to the expectations of that name and be all that it asked her to be—and more.

_At the time, I was simply pleased to be in the House known for being quick, witty, and wise. I soon forgot that I also possessed certain qualities that might have placed me in Slytherin. After all, information for its own sake was never quite enough for me._


	3. Part Two: A Day in the Life

**Part Two – A Day in the Life**

The dark was rising. Severus Snape was one of the first people to become aware of its insidious influence. The whispered name of Voldemort insinuated itself into Slytherin conversation like so many dirty socks into Severus' closed trunk, polluting the already uninviting environment.

He hated that. One would think twelve-year-old wizards were capable of picking up after themselves, yet the mess kept on encroaching. Consequently, he spent as little time in the dormitory as possible. He couldn't stand the mess and he didn't want to hear about some old freak who went around calling himself _stealing dead bodies_ in French. He had better things to do with his time.

Well, try to do, anyway. Evil as it was, Severus suffered from the common adolescent malady known as a _social life,_ and it kept getting worse. Try as he might to focus on his studies, his free time was constantly divided between three primary facets: Being dragged on unsavory pursuits with Lucius Malfoy and the rest of their Slytherin cohorts; actively hating James Potter, his gang, and Gryffindors in general; and having his company cleverly monopolized by Lily Evans. The former two were respectively given and unavoidable. Lily, however, was an enigma.

As a Gryffindor and a good friend of Potter, any interaction she had with Severus Snape should have been apologetic dismissal at best, if not downright cold rejection. Instead, she graced him with her amicable presence and amiable personality whenever she saw fit. There was a brilliant mind under there somewhere, Severus knew, but sometimes he really had to question her sanity.

"Are you _insane?_"

Sitting in a chair in the library, Severus reared up to his full height in peevish alarm.

"How many times to I have to tell you no? Which part of that do you not understand, the 'n' or the 'o'?"

"I'm going to do it, Sevvy," Lily assured him merrily. Severus cringed at the use of the nickname. "This Christmas you're going to wake up and go into your dreary little common room to open presents, and there they'll be! A pair of gleaming bright gold enchanted scissors, just waiting to take off about ten centimeters of that ridiculous hair of yours!" She mimed a snipping motion with the fingers of her right hand.

"I _like_ my hair this way," Severus growled, eyeing Lily's hand in a way that promised leg-locking curses and worse if it didn't go away. Sensibly, she withdrew.

"You are no fun at all, you know that?" Lily informed him. "Fine. If you're going to be that way, let's get on with this studying."

"That's what _I_ say." Severus' voice raised a decibel from sheer exasperation, earning him a severe look from the librarian. He quickly looked down at his books to avoid getting into further trouble by glaring back.

"You really are just an insufferable Gryffindor sometimes, you know that?" he snapped, mimicking the tone Lily had just employed. "If you're going to be that way, why don't you go find your boyfriend, Potter? He always has time to waste."

He shifted his attention to the Muggle Studies book under his nose (Accidental Etymology: "When Pigs Fly" and More), but his focus was jolted back to the present when Lily solidly smacked his upper arm.

"He's not my boyfriend!" she hissed, but she was turning red everywhere from the neck up. (Her blush clashed horridly with her fiery hair, Severus noted.) "And there's nothing wrong with Gryffindors. Admit it, you wouldn't have any fun at all if it weren't for me!" She smiled disarmingly.

"O no, none at _all,_" he replied, sarcasm dripping from his tongue like honey from an oversaturated hunk of comb, and not nearly so pleasant. "If it weren't for you I'd spend all my time with Lucius, and he's dull as a box of fireworks. Or, even worse, I might actually get something done! Go away, Evans. I really don't have time for this."

With that he turned firmly back to his textbook, determined to ignore Lily should she speak again.

But she did not, and after a minute or so she seemed to decide she didn't have time for Severus, either. She packed up her things and left the library, presumably to go work in her common room or the Great Hall. Severus felt a sort of grim satisfaction at having driven her away. If everyone was either afraid of him or simply disliked him, they would leave him alone. Being alone was by far preferable to being tortured daily with one stupid thing and another.

Lily would be back, though, and as long as Lucius and his cronies didn't know about it Severus would continue to tolerate her for reasons he couldn't, or wouldn't, fathom. In the meantime, rather than contemplate his accursed social life, he would do his homework and try to draw it out as long as he could stand it in order to delay the return to his dorm. If anything annoyed him more than Lily Evans, it was dirty socks in his trunk!

Some hours later, he reluctantly conceded that he was finished with his work for the night and began to pack up his things. He had missed dinner, but he didn't mind much. Severus tended to eat only when he felt hungry, which wasn't often. He couldn't have missed the evening meal by too long, though, for the library was just beginning to fill up with students looking to get some last-minute research in before curfew. All the more reason for Severus to leave. He picked up his bag and headed out of the library en route to the Slytherin common room.

He had not gone far before a tell-tale sound met his ears and the stench of refuse filled the air. This he ignored. Almost instantaneously, his wand was in his hand and his bag hit the floor with a dull _thwock._ He didn't know where they had gotten the dungbombs, but if James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, or that little twerp Peter Pettigrew showed so much as a shoelace, Severus was prepared to make sure they lived to regret this.

However, they didn't show, and only an elusive sound of boyish giggling bore testimony to their presence. Severus fumed, his dark eyes glittering coldly with rage—though perhaps the effect was due mainly to the acrid fumes in the air.

"Potter!" he bellowed, "I know you're there! The next time I see you you'll wish you'd never heard of dungbombs! You'll reek for a month! You hear me?"

"You hear something, Lupin?" said James Potter's laughing voice.

"Not a thing," answered Lupin. "Peter?"

"Nuh-uh," squeaked Peter Pettigrew. "Black?"

"Matter of fact, I did," Sirius Black said sagely. "Sounded _snivelly!"_

They had a good laugh at that while Severus tried in vain to locate them, stalking up and down the corridor and examining everything in it. Before he could figure it out, the laughter ceased.

"Whoop! Time to run," said Potter. "Smell you later, Snape!"

With the scuffle of four retreating pairs of shoes, the corridor fell silent again, but not for long. Only a few seconds went by before Severus found out what had precipitated the Gryffindors' sudden departure. Mrs. Norris appeared at the end of the hall and sat, red eyes fixed on Severus, tail curled smugly about her front paws. Her master was not far behind, and Severus was caught.

He didn't say a word as he was hauled off to detention. It was early enough in the evening that Filch decided _not_ to wait until the next day to deliver his punishment. Why wait when the fun could begin now and Mrs. Norris' several litter boxes needed cleaning? Severus had learned early on that there was no point in trying to explain himself to the caretaker of Hogwarts, and that anything he said would probably be used against him, so he kept his mouth shut even when Filch deliberately provoked him. Instead, he passed the time by devoting his energy to hating Potter and thinking murderous thoughts about him and all Gryffindors—except Lily. Lily had always been his friend before she was Potter's, however little sense it made. No way was Severus giving _him_ the satisfaction of messing with that!

By the time Severus got back to his dorm, after trying with marginal success to wash the stink of cat and dungbombs off himself, he had come up with five more ways to skin a cat, four potential methods of fulfilling his promise to Potter, eight additional torture techniques he'd like to try on the rest of them, (five golden rings!), and one more reason to put up with Lily. His homework was done, and Lucius was asleep already, so Severus wouldn't have to be endlessly taunted about the episode until tomorrow. All in all, he had to admit that it hadn't been such a bad day, after all. Maybe… maybe tomorrow the Voldemort craze would fade away just as it had come up, and his dorm mates would finally learn to take proper care of dirty laundry, and Lucius would stop being an asshole, and he, Severus, would take his final revenge on Potter and his gang.

As Severus fell into a sleep that proved to be fitful and uneasy, he had the strangest feeling that somewhere, the Ironic Overpower of the Universe was laughing at him.

_"Well, that wasn't so bad" is right up there with "well, it can't get any worse" on the list of phrases guaranteed to call unwanted attention to yourself on a cosmic scale. If any one of us had learned it sooner, we would have saved ourselves a lot of trouble._


	4. Part Three: Slytherin or Bust!

**Part Three – Slytherin or Bust!**

One year later, Morganna Montaque stepped proudly into the Great Hall with the new first years, pointedly ignoring the stares she was getting from most of the Hogwarts boys and some of the jealous Hogwarts girls. She couldn't deny that they had every reason to stare. She wasn't a typical first year and, more to the point, she was beautiful. She caught whispers of the word "veela" more than once as she took her place in line with the students waiting to be Sorted. She had chosen—and Aunt Margolotta had insisted on—being Sorted in public with the other kids so that she wouldn't be stuck with "that perfect, prissy, too-good-for-the-Sorting-Ceremony little French girl" as a reputation for the next six years, which she would be spending here in England. Yet, none of this was on her mind as she waited for her name to be called.

Morganna Montaque, more commonly known as Anna until now, had come to England from her home outside Paris near the end of the summer to meet Margolotta Winterburn, the aunt she would be living with for the duration of her time on the Island. She had taken a conventional Muggle train to London and on the way befriended four girls who were also going to Hogwarts for their second year: Sabrina Kirk, Sassy Bishop, Anne-Marie Kingsford and Marguerite Tempscire. The five of them arranged to go shopping together in town with the later addition of Marc Remillard, a thirteen-year-old who had been designated "Anna's Watcher" from the get-go. Morganna didn't understand why she should need a watcher—she certainly was not a little girl anymore, she could look after herself!—but she informed him that he could tag along, if he wished. He hadn't been happy about that, but she wasn't happy with him. So, he followed demurely behind the five chattering and giggling girls, not so much as a peep out of him until Anna stopped suddenly to stare into a shop window. Her new friends clustered around to see what she had seen, but they didn't find out until her deep blue eyes followed a tall boy with long, dark hair out of the shop.

Anna was entranced. There was something about him… the way he looked, the way he moved. The fact that he reminded her of a portrait she was fond of that hung in her home in France added to the effect. That painting had always fascinated her, with the dark, deep wells for eyes. This boy had the same eyes. And the hair!

"What?" she turned on Marc, who had groaned quietly when he realized whom she was watching.

"Nothing, Anna, nothing at all," he said, far too innocently to her mind, as if he didn't want her to find out something dark and secret. However, her friends were more than willing to discuss the boy named Severus Snape.

"He's going into third year; but don't even think about it," Sabrina cautioned. "He's in with Lucius Malfoy and _his_ lot, and they're trouble on wheels."

Sassy agreed. "Narcissa, she's all right, but Lucius? I'd rather be hung, drawn and quartered!"

"Snape knew more about the Dark Arts in his first year than most of the seventh years!"

"Still," Anna muttered to herself. Their warnings had amounted to naught more than a challenge in her mind, and she was not about to back down. So, she couldn't befriend Severus Snape? She would see.

* * *

"Montaque, Morganna!" The voice of Professor McGonagall broke through her reverie. 

She would see. She left the ranks of scared first years, sauntered up to the three-legged stool and sat down, placing the hat on her silvery-blond head.

_Severus' House,_ she thought forcefully before the ratty old thing could do anything.

"I _beg_ your pardon?" said the Sorting Hat.

_Severus' House, Severus' House, severus' house._

There was a minuscule pause. Anna thought she could feel the hat picking through her brain. All the while, she kept thinking _Severus' House_ as hard as she could. Suddenly she got a sense of finality and the voice of the hat chuckled.

"SLYTHERIN!"

Morganna smiled. One way or another, she got what she wanted. No doubt the hat recognized this. She set it back on its stool and went to sit at the Slytherin table, next to Severus Snape. He gave her the briefest glance and the barest muttered hello. She smiled dazzlingly up at him—he was far taller than she was.

"I'm Anna," she informed him when the Sorting was over and the whole hall exploded into excited conversation.

"She called you Morganna," Severus pointed out. His lack of expression spurred her on.

"I know, but I've never been called by that. I have a cousin the same age as me who has got the same name."

"How nice." Severus still didn't seem terribly interested. The feast was on the table by that time and he was gazing at a tureen of green peas with a look of suspicion, the most expression she had yet seen on his pale face. She decided to try a different tack.

"I saw you at the shops a while ago."

"Did you?" That seemed to get his attention, though his tone suggested that he wasn't entirely pleased about… something. However, Morganna was encouraged and leapt after this topic with enthusiasm.

"Yes," she said. "My friend Sabrina Kirk told me who you were."

"Sabrina Kirk?" he frowned, giving up on the peas and trying to recall the girl. "Brunette, talks a lot?"

"Yes, that's her," Anna smiled. Things were looking good! She knew she could—

"Well, Morganna," said Severus, the use of Anna's proper name making her wince, "it's been nice talking to you. Good night." He stood up and headed out of the Great Hall, leaving his space looking as though no one had been there at all.

"Bye," she murmured, staring after him in a state of mild shock. Perhaps this was going to be harder than she thought.

* * *

Severus breathed a sigh of relief the instant he was safely out of the Great Hall and thanked the Powers That Be that Lucius had been too busy charming that Narcissa girl to notice the exchange between Severus and Morganna. Why did she have to talk to him, of all people? Why not that Remillard character who had seated himself on her other side? He at least had seemed interested. He at least was a decent person, relative to the fact that he, too, was in Slytherin. Severus couldn't afford to be a decent person, not with Lucius Malfoy as his best friend. It wasn't that he had minded her paying attention to him. She had been friendly, and she was lovely. He would have to be blind and abysmally stupid not to see that she had the face of an angel. It was just that he wished she had chosen someone worthy of her company to talk to. God knew he certainly wasn't. 

He went back to his dormitory within the Slytherin dungeon and brooded face-down on his bed. His thoughts flew back to Lily Evans and her good intentions, whatever those were. Would this girl, Morganna, be any different? What was it with people trying to "fix" him, anyway? Why should they bother, and why should he bother with them? Was there any good reason for it?

So went his thoughts until Lucius and his cronies came to bully him into joining the activity in the common room. Severus supposed that he would write in his journal later, when they were all asleep… But, as usual, he found that he considered it safer for his true thoughts to remain locked away in his mind, unexpressed, not even on paper. Journals could be lost or stolen, the hexes on them broken, and he just couldn't have anyone reading his thoughts.

* * *

A week later, the commotion over the new second year girl nearly died down. The school schedule was in full swing. Starting that Monday, the staff decided to try an experiment they hoped would improve the performance of all the students, eventually. For now they were using the second and third years as guinea pigs. On Sunday morning, the lists of who was partnered with whom were posted in each House common room. 

"Anna, if you don't hurry up it will all have been for nothing, you know," Sabrina Kirk called impatiently. Morganna was in the bathroom doing her hair and Sabrina had been here outside the door long enough. "He'll have gone, and you'll have wasted my time and yours."

"I know!" Anna called back. "Just hold on a little longer, I am nearly finished."

Sabrina gave an exasperated sigh that her friend didn't hear. "It's your obsession," she murmured.

Morganna really was almost done now. She stood in front of the mirror checking her appearance one last time. It had taken the longest to curl her fine, silvery-blond hair into ringlets, which now framed her heart-shaped face in a most charming way. Her bright eyes sparkled with excitement as she secured the matching blue ribbon in place. This was the best luck she had had since she arrived at Hogwarts. All right, so that had only been a week ago, but she wanted to make the most of it anyway. She would start by looking her very best.

"An-_na!"_ Sabrina cried again. "Come on!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming!"

After checking one last time to see that the ribbon was anchored well, she darted out of the room and past Sabrina. "Let's go!"

"That's what I've been saying for the last ten minutes, Anna."

"Yes, yes, you told me," Anna said distractedly. The two girls dashed to the Slytherin common room, where most of the other second years and third years were. Sabrina hung back, but Anna hurried right up to one of the high-backed chairs around the fireplace and beamed down at its occupant.

"Who? What?" Severus Snape looked up with what seemed to be an expression of mixed curiosity and irritation at being disturbed.

Anna didn't care.

"You—I—we are paired," she told him breathlessly.

"Ah. Oh."

_No one ever told her to be careful what she wished for. No one ever told her if a thing seems too good to be true, it probably is. Maybe that's why it worked out._


	5. Part Four: Jenni and the Infamous Fritte...

**Part Four – Jenni and the Infamous Fritter Incident**

"D'you ever get the feeling that absolutely everything happens for a reason?"

The next Saturday found Jenni and Sylvia in the Great Hall working with Sylvia's study partner, a tall, gray-eyed boy known by the name Silvanus Trovillion. Jenni's original partner had given up on her after their first session, saying that Jenni asked too many questions about everything, so she had attached herself to Sylvia and Silvanus. She would have liked to make a real group of it by including Ame and her partner, but the third year girl had insisted they work by themselves in the library. She meant business. Jenni had been disappointed, but, there, that was life.

"I mean," Jenni went on, "did anyone else get a _feeling_ when that French girl got put into Slytherin so quick? Like it was supposed to, or not supposed to, happen? I can't tell which…" she trailed off, thinking about it.

Sylvia sighed. "Why don't you just talk to her? You were all set to make friends the first day. Why don't you?"

"You're changing the subject," Jenni accused, pointing her eight-inch rowan wood wand at her friend's nose. "Anyway, she's in Slytherin, isn't she? And she got sucked right into one of their little cliques as if she'd been there for ages! I never got a chance, now that I think of it." She propped her elbow on the book she was supposed to be studying and leaned into her wand hand. Jenni was a gregarious person, but one thing she lacked was the nerve to simply walk up to a complete stranger and ask to be friends. To add insult to injury, by the time she mustered the courage, the person had already been snapped up by the bolder socialites. It was depressing.

"Well, all I _feel_ is that we ought to get back to this studying before we get in trouble," said Silvanus, who didn't fancy getting bad marks on account of the highly amusing chatter of two second year girls. "Why don't we work some more on the Bottling Charm?"

The Bottling Charm was a fairly simple spell that, when done properly, caused a clear glass bottle to form around the object one pointed one's wand at while casting. The hardest part was focusing. Common mistakes were colored or clouded glass, malformed glass, and missing the object to be bottled. In this case, Silvanus levitated a white feather and the girls took turns bottling it.

"_Inserere Laguna,_" Sylvia muttered, reading the words out of her Charms book. "Did you know that the Latin word for 'fritters' is '_laganum?_'"

"Really?" Jenni said interestedly. "Ooh, I could really go for some of those right now…"

She contentedly imagined steaming stacks of golden-brown pancakes topped with perfect squares of real butter and dripping with deep red-amber syrup as Silvanus instructed Sylvia to perform the Charm, which she did admirably. Jenni, however, wasn't paying attention.

"Okay, Jenni: Go!"

"_Huh?_ Wh—Oh! _Inserere Laganum!_"

There was a substantial pause before anyone spoke.

"Well," said Silvanus, blinking bewilderedly, "You hit the feather."

"Yeah," Jenni said in much the same tone, "I did."

Said feather was now in shreds. There was a scent of ozone and singed keratin in the air and haphazard piles of perfectly round, golden-brown fritters on the table and floor. Wisps and pieces of white poked out of this one and that one. The few other people occupying the Great Hall turned their heads and laughed at the mishap.

"Um… Why don't we take a break for now?" Silvanus suggested. "You two clean up and we'll pretend it never happened, okay?" He quickly gathered up his things and high-tailed it out of the Hall so that he would be out of hearing when he could no longer contain his laughter.

"Huh! Some break," Sylvia quipped. "Good job, Jenni. Two weeks in and I'm already on clean-up duty." She plucked a fritter with a feather poking out its side off her book and tossed it to the floor, where it landed with a plop.

"It's not my fault. You were the one that started me thinking about them in the first place." Jenni surveyed the area again and giggled. "Bet you couldn't have done this if you tried," she teased.

"Bet I could," the dark-haired girl retorted. "Only, I wouldn't."

"Why not? That was bloody brilliant!" said a new voice.

Sylvia and Jenni looked up. Four boys stood over them, grinning. Sylvia groaned inwardly. Gryffindors. Perfect. Everyone in Ravenclaw House knew that Gryffindors as a rule were an unruly lot with no discipline to speak of and who gave no thought to their futures at all. Both girls knew this quartet by reputation, if not by name.

"Says who?" Jenni demanded guardedly. She appreciated the compliment, if it was genuine and not sarcastic in nature. However, she was taking no chances.

"Says us," answered a second speaker. He seemed to be at the head of the group. His hair was black and unruly and he wore glasses, the eyes behind them sparkling with good humor as he extended his hand to Jenni. "James Potter, congratulating you on a smashing piece of mischief!"

She shook James's hand—his grip was cool and firm—still watching them warily.

"Mr. Sirius Black would like to corroborate the statements of both Mr. Potter and Mr. Lupin," said a third boy, who also shook Jenni's hand. He was tall and powerfully built, dark of hair and eye. "Remus Lupin, that is," he went on, indicating the first speaker. "And this is Peter Pettigrew."

Remus merely nodded his head and continued to grin, but Peter stepped forward exuberantly to clasp hands. He was rather pudgy, his palm clammy, and Jenni found that she had an immediate distaste for him. She wondered if he had ever touched a girl before or ever would again, but quashed the thought.

"Charmed, I'm sure," she said, "but seeing as I didn't do it on purpose, it was hardly mischief."

"Eh," James shrugged, seeming to take this in stride, "that's all right."

"Some of the best discoveries were found out by accident," Remus put in. Laughter breathed life into a voice that was generally tired and expressionless, and Jenni picked up on this. She couldn't say exactly what it was about his tone that caught her attention, but she found herself heeding him more than the others—though she kept an eye on Peter.

Seemingly unaware of this, James went on.

"That's right," he said, "and since it's our sworn duty to propagate all manner of amusing waggery—"

"_Waggery?"_

"Yeah. Anyway, intentional or not, you're deserving of an honorable mention on our list of tomfoolerers. What's your name? You haven't said."

Jenni regarded James with an increasingly ironical grin. Against her better judgment, she almost liked these Gryffindor scalawags. "I haven't had a chance to say," she said, standing up. "Jennifer Robinson, Ravenclaw. My friend is Sylvia Blackridge."

Sylvia nodded in acknowledgment of her name. She had been observing silently the whole time and saw no need to speak now. She knew Jenni could—and would—do what she pleased.

"I suppose it's an honor to be noticed by you four?" Jenni asked teasingly.

"An honor!" cried James. Remus and Peter exchanged an amused look.

"Why, it's the highest, most notorious honor to be had in this place!" Sirius enthused. "Unless you count being a Quidditch Chaser, of course," he added with a mock-envious look at James.

"Oh, be quiet, Sirius!"

Jenni and Sylvia looked on as the two friends got into a playful shoving match that lasted for all of ten seconds before Remus intervened. Despite being jostled on both sides as James and Sirius struggled to get back at each other, he held them firmly by the collars of their black robes.

"I… think… we'll be going now," Remus said haltingly with a wry smile. He started backing away, taking his friends with him.

"Yeah," James grinned. "I fancy it's time to pitch some seasoned old socks into Snape's cauldron."

"See you," Remus said in parting.

They turned and headed out of the Great Hall, Peter trotting after them.

Sylvia and Jenni exchanged a bemused look and stared after them until something went "click" in Jenni's mind. She blinked.

"'Snape?' As in Severus Snape?"

"Only one I know of," Sylvia muttered.

"Isn't he the guy what's-her-name-that-new-girl got partnered up with?"

"Could be. Yeah, I guess I saw them in the library once or twice, now that I think about it." The dark-haired girl shrugged. "Bit of an odd contrast, they were. Why?"

"No reason," Jenni said. "Hey, we better get these fritters picked up before Filch turns up and has a fit."

Sylvia nodded fervently in agreement and, with that, the two of them got to work. The Great Hall was back to normal in no time, but the Infamous Fritter Incident went down in Jenni's personal history and was never forgotten.

_As it turned out, it had happened for a reason. Some rather uneventful years had to pass before anyone figured out what that reason was._


	6. Part Five: June Reflections, January Rev...

**Part Five – June Reflections, January Revelations**

The summer day that Jenni woke to the realization that three years had passed and left her quite different from the little girl she had once been was a turning point in her life. That was the day she had paused after mechanically brushing her hair and taken a good look at herself in the strange person facing her from the other side of the mirror hanging on the wall in the bathroom.

Jenni never bothered much with mirrors. Her appearance was not something she troubled greatly about and she never could get over the odd sensation they gave her. As looking at Ame was like looking at a reflection of herself, it had taken her the longest time to understand that mirrors showed her herself and not her twin. In later years, she found that she simply had no great use for them. But that day, a close inspection of her looking-glass self afforded her deeper insight into the person she was becoming.

That her body was changing was the first thing she took notice of. The rounding of her figure had happened so subtly over the years that she hadn't given it a moment's thought, yet that was no flat-chested, boxy little girl that stood before her, but a young woman. And a pleasantly developed one, too, she thought, turning sideways and arching her back in a moment's vain indulgence. Taller, as well—she didn't have to stand on tip-toes to get a decent view anymore.

Suddenly she felt silly and resumed a normal position, smiling at her own folly. What if her parents had walked in just then?

Let them, she decided. Why shouldn't she be proud of her own body? Enough relatives and friends of the family had said that Jenni and Ame were pretty that Jenni could consider believing it. Why not? Straight, fine, thick chocolate colored hair framed a nice enough face. Most of the babyish roundness had long since left it, leaving high cheekbones to show through and give her a vaguely angular look, though hardly so much as to be severe like her mother. A strong jaw line underscored planar cheeks and a firm chin, afflicted only slightly with adolescent pimples. Her mouth wasn't what she would call remarkable. It wasn't too wide or too small, though it tended to list to the left when she smiled as she did now, making her look terribly mischievous even when she didn't mean to be.

Fortunately, her eyes made up for it. They were her best trait, in her mind. They were green—not that pale, washed-out excuse for green that some people had, and not hazel, but bold, clear, hunter green. Serious eyes, set under expressive, mobile eyebrows and evenly spaced on either side of a straight nose. Yes, and she smiled again, she had very good eyes. However, they would mean nothing without the mind behind them.

"Jenni, dear?" Her ruminations were interrupted by her mother's voice, accompanied by three sharp raps on the bathroom door. "Are you all right in there?"

"Yeah, mum," she replied hastily, embarrassed at coming that close to being caught mirror-gazing by her very modest and proper mother. "I'm fine. I'm just coming out."

Flipping her hair behind her shoulders where it belonged, Jenni opened the door and slipped out under the scrutiny of her American parent.

"You're starting to sound so British. 'Mum'!" was the woman's passing comment.

Jenni ignored her and continued to her own room, where she found Ame browsing her personal library. They both loved to read and enjoyed much the same subjects, but where Ame tended to stock practical and educational material, Jenni's shelves were stacked with fiction novels ranging from Asimov to McCaffrey to Tolkien. (Not even wizards had many surnames ending with the last six letters of the alphabet and, as Jenni maintained for the entirety of her existence, Muggles were the best writers, anyway.) According to Jenni, good fiction stimulated the whole brain and got one thinking in new and different ways.

"Try The Clan of the Cave Bear," she recommended, taking a seat on her bed. "Really well-researched—herbal remedies of the Neolithic era and such. Really smashing read. If you don't mind a bit of graphic detail and key character death by tuberculosis…" she amended, eyes rolling heavenward in a show of innocent reflection.

"Jenni! Don't tell me!" Ame protested the spoiling with cheerful good humor as she took the thick book down and went out the door, careful to close it behind her to give her sister some privacy.

Jenni chuckled after her. As shy and self-effacing as she was at Hogwarts, Ame really had a sense of humor. She knew how key character death irked Jenni, anyway. Somehow, she had a horrible tendency to favor the ones who ended up dying in the end. If it wasn't natural old age (which was bad enough), it was heart attacks; if it wasn't a heart attack, it was consumption!

_Maybe I'm cursed,_ she thought bitterly.

They were never the characters who by rights should die, either. They were always the ones who deserved nothing but the best from the world. Of course, Jenni didn't like to think that anyone deserved death, full stop. She kept a special place in her heart for the Misunderstood, Used, and Abused of all worlds—those souls condemned by society because circumstances forced them to hide behind a façade of darkness for their own protection. The Phantom of the Opera was her favorite example, but she could name others.

That brought her back to her changing self, her mind in particular. The way she looked at the world had undergone huge alterations since finding out she was a witch. If magic was real, then what other impossible things might be attempted? She wondered…

She wondered…

"Jenni!"

Her train of thought was derailed by Sylvia Blackridge. Startled out of her reflections, she was momentarily confused. Hadn't she—? What was—? Where was she? This wasn't her room. Ah, but it was, she realized as the present came flooding back to her.

She was in the room she shared with Sylvia and three others in the Ravenclaw girls' dormitory at Hogwarts, sitting on her bed. It was January now, a few days after Christmas but before the school resumed its regular schedule. Furthermore, it was Saturday morning.

Sylvia hung in the doorway looking irritated about something or another behind her recently acquired glasses. She impatiently brushed a strand of her long black hair out of her face as Jenni spoke:

"What?"

"You're going to miss breakfast if you don't hurry up," Sylvia pointed out tiredly, as if she wondered why she bothered with anything anymore. "Your Gryffindor friends are looking for you, too. Come on!"

Jenni vacillated between annoyance at this intrusion and the feeling she should be happy her friend. She had been seeing less and less of Sylvia outside of class, but Sylvia had taken the time to fetch her for someone else. It was an uneasy combination and not one that Jenni particularly wanted to deal with right then, so she put off the uncalled-for annoyance and responded with a smile.

"All right, I'll only be a moment. Thanks." She swung her feet over the side of the bed and got up, then started looking for her shoes.

"Sure," Sylvia responded vaguely. "I'll see you later, Jenni." She turned and disappeared back into the labyrinth passages of Hogwarts.

Jenni regarded her critically as she walked away. She didn't like the feeling she got from Sylvia, but she couldn't pinpoint the source of the trouble. It seemed ridiculous to think that Sylvia was jealous of her "Gryffindor friends." The two of them got along, Jenni and Sylvia, but they had never been more than school-time associates. In any case, the truth was that Jenni spent very little time with James Potter and his group. They almost always had a crowd around them when they weren't up to something dodgy, and she found that she disliked James and Sirius' standoffish attitudes and bullying ways. So, no, Sylvia certainly couldn't be jealous of that!

Really, the only Gryffindors Jenni knew who were worth talking to were Lily Evans and Remus Lupin. Remus was milder-mannered and made better conversation than his friends, and in Lily she found a sort of kindred spirit, though they would tend to disagree on certain points of morality. Perhaps one of them had asked for her.

But this was not so. Upon reaching the Great Hall, she found a great congregation with James Potter and Sirius Black at its head.

"Fritter-girl! Hey, Jenni!" called James, spotting her through the crowd. He raised himself up using a bench to give him a boost and waved her over.

Jenni sighed, but pressed her lips together in resignation and made her way over to him.

"What's going on?" she asked, indicating the crowd. She was surprised that Filch was allowing this, when she thought about it. After looking around and seeing no teachers present at all, she narrowed her eyes at James. "Where are the teachers? What did you do?"

"Calm down!" James laughed and tousled his already unruly black hair. "They're safely occupied dealing with an unfortunate little incident in the dungeons, aren't they, Sirius?"

"Sure are," he responded with a wolfish grin.

Jenni wondered what they meant by "safely," but didn't press the issue.

"All right, fine," she said, and tried to smile. "So what's all this got to do with me?"

"Nothing at all, if you don't want to," said James, actually being serious. "We were just organizing this snow war before class starts again and wondered if you wanted to join in the fun. The more the merrier!" he intoned.

Her smile was natural now. It was nice to be remembered, even if only by a scoundrel like James. Still and all, she wasn't interested. She wasn't done meditating yet. Furthermore, she couldn't see Remus in a snowball fight, and she wondered if she might find a rare opportunity to talk to him alone while the others gamboled in the snow.

"I think I'll just watch, if it's all the same to you," she said. "I'd like to eat breakfast and I don't want to hold you up if you're going to form teams—or even if you're not," she added, thinking of their diversion and wondering how long it would last.

"Smashing," said James. "See you!"

Presently, at a signal from James and with the aid of Sirius, the posse trouped out. Just in time, as luck would have it, for Argus Filch cottoned on to the fact that something was up. He came dashing in through a side entrance just as the last few people were leaving, causing them to scurry the rest of the way out lest they be caught. Filch needed little excuse to call for detention, particularly when Potter and Black were involved.

The students were lucky this time. The caretaker's wild eyes were so busy with the Great Hall itself that he was blinded to the dash out the doors. As Jenni took a seat at the Ravenclaw table, she was treated to the sight of Filch puffing and fuming at no one in particular, a sight at which a great deal of effort was required to keep from laughing out loud. She could almost pity the man. He looked like he was heading straight for stomach ulcers, if not death by an aneurysm or a heart attack at an early age.

That returned Jenni to her thoughts of earlier that morning. All right, so it wasn't _only _good people who died of heart attacks and such. On the contrary, often it was a person's unhealthy lifestyle and bad attitude that led them to their fate. However, she found it hard to believe that anyone was inherently evil. One could perhaps have a predisposition toward selfish or uncaring behavior, but she could argue that it was circumstance that pushed them over the edge. Perhaps even the self-styled Dark Lord, who was appearing in the papers with increasing frequency, has his reasons for disliking Muggles and half-bloods like her. That didn't make such thinking right, but perhaps an understanding of the man behind the name could shed light on a way to bring him back, to redeem him.

In the arrogance of youth, it did not occur to her that Lord Voldemort had no wish to ever be Tom Marvolo Riddle again and would simply laugh in the face of anyone stupid and misguided enough to try to "help" him—prior to killing them, that is.

It was a lovely winter morning and, after a good breakfast of oatmeal and toast, she was in high spirits and eager for the day. Once she was done she went back up to Ravenclaw tower to fetch her winter cloak, striped scarf, boots, and a book, then proceeded out to the castle grounds. The crisp, chill air filled her lungs as she inhaled deeply, refreshing and delighting her soul. The sun was hidden behind a thick shawl of clouds, but occasionally she would peek out and set the snow a-glimmering. Jenni could hear the shouts and clamor of the boys and girls engaging in James' snow war and, smiling, she struck out toward the noise.

* * *

Little did she know that she was not the only solitary person out that morning. She later learned that Severus Snape had been out early, having not slept well the night before, and now was trapped on the wrong side of the crowd. They occupied a relatively narrow strip of land between the castle and the frozen lake, blocking his way to the doors. A black scowl twisted Severus' face as he backed against the cold stone wall, the book he had brought with him clutched hard against his side. Silently he swore to himself that if any snowball from the hand of one of the Potter Morons came his way—every one of them illegally jinxed, he had no doubt—that snowball would be the last they ever threw. He couldn't see Lily or Morganna, so by all the heavens and hells he would not be stopped! For the time being, however, he chose to lie quietly like a serpent unless he was disturbed. Potter was moving around too much for Severus to curse him properly without giving himself away.

* * *

Meanwhile, Jenni found a tree that offered good climbing and a view of the activity below. She charmed her book so that it would follow her, then ascended into the tree's leafless boughs. On the way up she did spot Remus, sitting comfortably on the sidelines some meters away from her. However, Peter Pettigrew was with him, so she held herself to catching his eye rather than approaching. He saw her and treated her to one of his slow, sad smiles and waved. Jenni spared a hand to wave back before continuing on her way up. 

In the event that she couldn't talk to Remus, Jenni intended to read while she was outside (magic ensured that she never had to remove her hands from her gloves to turn pages), but she never opened the book. She found that the activity on the ground captivated her. Watching them, one would never guess that there was any darkness in this world or any other. Or that O.W.L.'s were just months away for some, she added wryly as a reminder of that inevitability inserted itself forcibly into her consciousness. Yet, she knew that if she looked closer, into the depths of their eyes, would see the evidence of trials past and present there. There wasn't a person alive who didn't have something in their lives to trouble them. If there was, she didn't want to meet them. In her mind, perfection was itself somehow perverted and corrupt.

_Well, of course,_ she mused. If the Universe was in any sort of balance, then for any one force there had to be an equal and opposite force to keep it in check. One might seem to grow stronger for a time, but it would always be pushed back. Therefore, if there was a person out there who was perfect—perfectly good, for example—then there would have to be someone else who was perfectly evil. As Jenni had told herself twice already, she did not believe in pure evil, and furthermore, she found that she _knew_ there was no such thing as pure good. There was always the ulterior motive of self-pleasure, even if the benefits of action A were completely mutual. Even co-dependent people sought happiness through self-neglect, as goofy as that sounded. Perhaps they thought the only way to be good was to be miserable. Did being miserable do anyone any good? Was good a miserable thing to be?

Jenni laughed quietly to herself. She would have to ask Ame about that. Her twin was the most co-dependent person she knew. Odd, considering her own fierce independence, but not surprising. They balanced each other.

But speaking of fierce…

Jenni sat up as much as her arboreal perch would allow and peered down toward the castle, where she could have sworn she had just seen a pale, scowling face peek from around a corner. She kept watching and—yes!—there he was again, risking a longer look this time. She knew the boy by reputation. His name was Snape, and he was the sworn enemy of James Potter. She had heard all about that conflict, mostly from Lily, but James was a school celebrity and word of his deeds passed quickly through the hallowed halls of Hogwarts. Having known James, Jenni sympathized more and more with Severus at every turn. Seeing him now, trapped as he was, she wondered why she had never spoken these feelings to him before. Then again, he was a Slytherin with a particularly grim record. He never would accept any sympathy from Jenni, judging by Lily's reports. Still…

Still…

Her curiosity was piqued now, and her thoughts flew into a jumble of everything that had passed through her mind since waking that morning. Here was a perfect example of someone living a dark façade. Scenes of what his past life must have been like to bring him to his present state flashed before her inner eye. Her Divination teacher assured her she had one and she almost believed it. Yet, as clearly as she might imagine, she would never _know_ unless she asked.

It was then that she had her first revelation about the ways of the Universe and how they concerned her, Jennifer Robinson.

Swiftly coming to a conclusion without once being conscious of doing so, she scrambled down from the tree, gathered her book to her side, and made her way around the field of enthusiastic snowballers. She skirted the lake, taking a round-about route toward her destination to avoid drawing unwanted attention to herself, and looked for some suitable cover as she went. A great old pine tree rose magnificently to the occasion, and she took swift advantage of it. She didn't think anyone had taken notice of her. She peered through the evergreen's branches to make sure. She could see Severus from where she was, but his attention was focused on a Slytherin girl with dark red hair who had apparently found him while Jenni had been busy hiding. Jenni frowned, irked, and she wasn't the only one. She couldn't hear the conversation between Severus and the girl over the shouts of the snowballers, but, judging by the expression on the tall boy's face, it wasn't a pleasant exchange.

Forgetting to make sure that her movements went unchecked by James and his friends, Jenni left her hiding place and sidled up to the wall, careful to remain a discreet distance from Severus and the girl. From what Jenni could gather, it seemed that the two of them were at odds over some behavior on Severus' part. The girl threatened to leave, as in leave the school and go away. This seemed silly to Jenni as neither Hogwarts nor the girl's parents were likely to support this, but there were the effects of hormones.

Even at the age of fifteen, Jenni was largely unaffected by hormones. She had very little sexual interest in either gender, and only then when she consciously thought about boys in that way. That didn't stop the rest of the world.

Suddenly, there was a burst of activity in the field. Apparently, someone had caught wind of the approach of Filch, and the snowballers began to scatter. James and company were, of course, the first to vanish, leaving the rest to fend for themselves as inexpertly as they would. While this was going on, the dark redheaded Slytherin girl took the opportunity to go off in a huff. Much to Jenni's surprise, Severus followed her.

So Jenni's first chance at talking to the boy called Severus Snape had been no chance at all. She sighed, drawing on a store of self-satisfaction she kept for such times. She could deal with that. She knew what she must do.

_Everyone has a mask they wear to face the world, clinging to it even when it has ceased to do them any good. My revelation showed me that I was equipped with the knowledge and tools to break through the toughest of them, and if anyone needed cracking it was Severus Snape._


	7. Part Six: The Birds and the Buzz

**Part Six – The Birds and the Buzz**

Morganna Montaque found that a great deal of her spare time at Hogwarts was spent by the shores of the lake that lapped at the feet of the cliff the castle sat upon. She wasn't on the cliff, but further down the shoreline and thus a good distance from the castle itself. It was a good place to sit and think, provided no one else was around. Lots of people liked to spend their free time down here.

Today, however, the grounds were mostly deserted. A chill wind was whistling through the dark, barren trees of the Forbidden Forest, and a thick blanket of snow covered the ground. It was much too cold for most people's liking, this day in the early weeks of March, but Morganna hunkered down by the water's edge and bore it.

She had had one of her tremors earlier that day. She had a moderately serious form of a congenital disease that would occasionally see fit to put her through bouts of pain that would make her tremble, and generally weakened her immune system at such times. In turn, she was more likely to shake, as she put it, when she was ill or otherwise stressed. The whole thing was her secret. There had been an older sister who had died of this disease at the age of sixteen. Morganna knew there was a possibility that she might share Gloria-Anne's fate, and she preferred that people _not_ fret and dote on her in the meantime.

Morganna (she had given up being called Anna) shivered at the thought of that sister she had never known and hugged her drawn-up knees tighter to herself. No… she couldn't go like that. Not now, when so much was beginning to happen. There was the matter of Lily Evans, for one. The sixth year girl seemed increasingly distraught any time that dratted James Potter came up, and it was so strange because Lily had always been the one to have a handle on things and mediate between the Marauders and the rest of the world. Morganna worried about her.

Then there was the relationship of Narcissa with Lucius Malfoy, a coupling that on one understood and yet had been constant since their third year. The two certainly _looked_ good together. Narcissa's severe kind of beauty complimented Lucius' suave, self-confident handsomeness. But, until recently, Narcissa's personality had not seemed the type Lucius would go for. Narcissa's appearance hadn't reflected her character at all. She had been rather warm, bubbly, and caring—rather like Morganna, in fact—but now, two years after falling under Lucius' spell, all that had changed. It was rare to see any of that affection turned on anyone apart from Lucius these days. More often she was frosty and aloof to the rest of school. However, in the rare moments Morganna got the older girl away from the rest of the group, she seemed withdrawn and agitated, though she would insist that everything was fine. Morganna worried about her, too.

There were numerous things Morganna could choose to cite in explanation of this most recent attack. There was always school, specifically the approaching O.W.L. tests. Everyone in her year was at least a little bit stressed about those. Then there was Morganna's family back in France. She heard from them from time to time, and some news was less encouraging than the rest. Thinking of news, there were the Voldemort rumors that abounded these days, especially in the Slytherin common room. All that was disturbing in one way or another, but when she was being honest with herself, as she was now, it all came down to one thing. One _person_.

Severus Snape.

His group and Morganna's group tended to be separated a good deal of the time due to being in different years. However, there were connections that brought them together at times. Morganna relished those times. Ever since the failed study partner experiment in her second year, she had fulfilled that promise to herself many times over. It had taken a while, but eventually Severus had warmed up to her. Sometimes when they talked, she got the sense that he told her things he had never hinted at to anyone else before. He would speak his thoughts to her and, sometimes, even his feelings. In fact, he had eventually come to her, Morganna Montaque, after the unpleasant event of last June known to everyone except Severus as the Underpants Incident. That made her feel incredibly special.

Things had gone back to normal with the start of the new term. Now, however, she thought she sensed a change in Severus' attitude toward her. Most of the time he seemed cool and reserved—this was normal; but sometimes she could swear she felt his eyes on her when he thought she wasn't paying attention. When she was studying for her O.W.L.'s, or in the busy corridors between classes, she would suddenly look up and he would be there.

It was hard to say whether or not she was imagining things, what with everything that was on her mind, but it was this slight change that overthrew her equilibrium and brought on the attack of earlier today. At least, that was what Morganna thought. That was why she had to come out here to get away and mull these things over in peace. Lily and Narcissa knew about her illness and helped her to hide it from everyone else, including Severus. Morganna wouldn't be able to stand it of he found out now. He would either worry about her of draw away from her, and she did not like either of those ideas at all.

Imagine her surprise when she heard his unmistakable voice behind her!

"Morganna."

She drew a quick breath and spun around in shock, landing on her butt in the process and flushing red in addition to the pink tinge her cheeks had acquired due to the cold. Her blue eyes went wide. There was Severus, dressed head to foot in black winter gear, hands thrust deep into his cloak pockets. He made an impressive figure against the stark backdrop of white snow and grey sky. His deep-set black eyes gazed down at her with their usual expression of bored indifference, clustered strands of shoulder-length black hair tossing idly in the stiff, chill breeze.

"Severus," squeaked Morganna. She quickly picked herself up off the ground and stood, self-consciously brushing snow from her cold backside.

"When no one knew where you were, I thought I'd look here," he informed her nonchalantly. "You shouldn't be out. Hurry up and come inside before you catch your death." He mumbled something more that sounded a bit like "damned inconvenient" and turned to head back to the castle himself. Whether he was referring to having to come down here to fetch Morganna or the prospect of her catching her death remained an open question.

Morganna's first response was to behave like Daddy's good little girl, for that she had been, and follow demurely. That didn't last long. Daddy wasn't here. Severus had appeared at a most inconvenient time and caused her to seem silly in his eyes, and that made her angry.

"And who are you to tell me what to do and where to go?" she heard herself saying in haughty, affronted tones. She lifted her chin and peered down her nose at him—as much as anyone could peer down at a much taller person, anyway.

Severus paused to look back at her coolly over his bony shoulder. After a moment, he shrugged indolently and turned away again.

"Fine. Stay here and freeze," he said as he resumed walking.

Morganna gaped at first, stung by his words and the sudden knowledge that her own had been just as insensitive in their way. She shivered, and that spurred her into action.

"Hey!" she called, jogging after Severus as best she could. Damn weakness. "Ii—it's not that cold," she stammered, drawing up beside him.

The snow crunched beneath their shoes, but Severus was silent as old stone.

Morganna panicked. What had she done? She hadn't _meant _to imply that he was nothing to her. It had come out wrong! Was he really that angry about it?

"Sevvy—" she reached up to grasp his arm, but all she got was a handful of black cloak. Oh well—he stopped, which was what she had wanted. She put on her very best pouting smile and gazed entreatingly at him. "You wouldn't really want me to freeze, would you?" Er, yeah. _That_ was what she was concerned about. Damn it!

However, Severus surprised her again. His regard was impassive for a moment, but then something stirred in the depths of his eyes. There was a slight shift in his stance, and he seemed somehow to warm a bit.

"No. I wouldn't want you to freeze," he said in an almost gentle voice. Her hand, still gripping his cloak, hung suspended near his arm. That arm rose, as if he were going to reach for her cold, flushed cheek. Bright blue eyes widened, and for a moment Morganna feared that her rapidly beating heart would betray her.

Only a moment. Severus let that hand fall, and the other reached across to take his cloak from her and brusquely straighten it.

"So?" he said in his usual gruff manner. "Are you coming, or do I carry you like a stubborn, spoilt child?"

Morganna faced forward and held back a sigh. The moment was over, and it really was quite cold out here.

"I'm coming, Severus. I'm coming."

They trekked the rest of the way to the castle in a silence neither companionable nor particularly uncomfortable. The cold wind passed them swiftly by on its way to more hospitable southern climes, and that was all. In truth, Morganna was very relieved to step into Hogwarts's warm, sheltered entrance hall. She and Severus stood together a moment, rubbing their hands and attempting to breathe some warmth back into them. Presently, though, Severus paused and spoke shortly to her:

"I'll see you at dinner, Morganna."

And he was gone without a backward glance. Morganna looked around in puzzlement, and the cause of this sudden departure was revealed in the form of Lucius Malfoy, who had stopped on his way to the dungeons and was sending a pointed gaze in Severus' direction.

* * *

Severus resumed idly brushing his hands together as he stalked away from Morganna. He had no real hope that they would warm up, but making the empty gesture to correct the situation gave him the right to complain about it. He did so complain. 

"Bloody intolerable weather," he grumbled as he came alongside Lucius and matched strides with the weasel-faced blond.

"Ah, Snape. You know you love it. It suits your demeanor," replied Lucius, who couldn't resist a chance to have a go at his compatriot. Severus grunted irritably, but had no rejoinder.

Lucius chuckled. "So, I see you're still hanging around with your little pet veela," he commented. "I'm surprised she hasn't turned on you yet—evil is unpredictable, you know." This was one of Lucius' favorite jibes.

"Au contraire," said Severus, his inadvertent use of French making Lucius laugh harder. Severus seethed and went on. "Evil is one of the more predictable forces on Earth. It's good that will bite you on the arse if you're not watching carefully. In any case, Morganna is not my 'pet' anything, unlike you and your girlfriends past and present—the thought of which, by the way, still makes me physically ill." Severus resettled the sit of his cloak on his shoulders, defying Lucius to comment on the subject of girlfriends with sheer presence alone. "What do you want, anyhow?"

The spar ended with both egos feeling that they had won. Lucius grinned and quickened his pace, gesturing impatiently at Severus.

"Just shut up and follow me. I want to show you something."

They traversed the winding dungeon corridors on what eventually turned out to be one of the more indirect routes to the Slytherin dormitory. However, they didn't reach the portal. One corner and a hallway away, Lucius halted and indicated that Severus should peek around the corner. Severus lifted one black eyebrow, but did so.

"A gang of chatty mixed first years that happen to be down our hallway?" Severus was not impressed. "Malfoy, I'm reasonably certain I have bett—"

"Shh!" hissed Lucius. "My God, Snape, you're such a damn killjoy sometimes! Now, pay attention and tell me if Mister 'Master of the Dark Arts' has seen this before!" He pulled out his wand and muttered the words of a curse in the general direction of the first years.

Severus, who did in fact recognize the curse but had never tried it himself and seriously doubted that Lucius could pull it off, drew a deep breath and waited. Eventually Lucius' ears turned red with the effort, but all he managed was a puff of golden smoke.

"I know I can get it!" he snarled, and raised his wand again.

Severus let his breath out as a sigh, none the worse for the delay. "Don't give yourself a nosebleed, Malfoy. It's not worth it. I don't know how you got it, but I know the spell. It would have been very amusing, but the fact is that only the most advanced seventh years could manage it and you're just not there yet. Anyway, it'd be more fun to save that sort of thing for the Potty Patrol, wouldn't you say?" A cruel little smirk stretched Severus' thin lips.

"Bah!" growled Lucius. "I hate it when you're right. _Naris crudum._" He shot a dark red bolt of light at the crowd in vindictive parting as he and Severus turned away.

The Ravenclaw boy who was hit by the jinx had his back turned to Severus and Lucius, and none of the others had been paying him much attention at the time. No one knew why a steady trickle of blood suddenly began to drip from his right nostril. His friends rushed him directly up to the hospital wing, where Ame Robinson had been volunteering her free time since the first month of that school year. Ame reported the incident to her twin, because Jenni was in Ravenclaw and seemed interested. Jenni thought of it later in a class-related discussion with Lily Evans. Lily worried aloud to Morganna Montaque that Lucius Malfoy was up to more of his usual shenanigans, and that was how it got back in Severus' ear that evening in the Slytherin common room.

Severus' eyebrows raised a fraction of a hair in mild astonishment. Well, well…

"Well. Lucius is a moron, that's a given, but don't believe everything you hear—and tell Evans, too. You know how rumors get around this hole."

_The relationship between Morganna and Severus, Severus and Lucius, fascinated me. Of all the influences on Severus' life, those were two of the most profound._


	8. Part Seven: Winds of Change

**Part Seven – Winds of Change**

Rumors flew on owls' wings at Hogwarts. By the end of the month, Voldemort, self-styled Dark Lord of the wizarding world, had made headline news in The Daily Prophet with a kill total of seven. It only took one paper. Soon the whole school, to say nothing of the rest of the magical community, buzzed with an undercurrent of mild alarm. Surely, this was just some crazed lunatic the Ministry of Magic would soon catch and shut up in Azkaban forever? Most people, students and adults alike, still wanted to believe that. However, those who knew more had said the same when the name of Voldemort had just been a whisper of a threat. They weren't so certain anymore.

It still seemed worlds away from the daily life of classes, homework, and social concerns at school, though, at least as far as Jenni was concerned. She didn't get The Prophet and tended to take word of mouth with a grain of salt.

"Ame, half of any news story is fictional and designed to get the readers to buy more papers," she said to her sister. They were sitting under a window in the library, trying to get some O.W.L. preparation in between lunch and noon classes. At least, that was the pretense. Ame was concerned about the recent events and Jenni's mind was on another plane entirely. She attended to the here and now just enough to communicate clearly. She went on: "You know that. Believe me, I think it's awful that anyone had to die, but there's nothing we can do about it and it's nothing to do with us anyway, right?" Cheap reasoning to her own ears, but she would be the first to admit she was not thinking when she said it.

"I'm thinking about writing to the families," Ame said quietly, the very lack of any accusation in her tone a reproach. "Jenni, the ones that got killed were all Muggle-born or half-bloods like you and me. Did you know that? I think a lot of people are really scared, and I… I am, too."

Jenni looked openly into Ame's face now. Come to think of it, she had heard something to that effect before. She couldn't recall where or when, though.

"Well, fritters, Ame." Jenni sighed. "I don't know what else to say. I don't know enough about it. I've been thinking of other things. 'Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—Of cabbages—and Kings.'"

Ame lifted her chin slightly and smiled. "Maybe you're right. Maybe this will all blow over by summer and I'm taking things too seriously again. I think I'll go see if Madam Pomfrey needs anything done in the infirmary." She started tentatively gathering her books.

"Don't think it, do it," Jenni replied with a firm nod, reaching for her own materials. She wasn't getting anything accomplished in the library, so: "I'm going to go outside. See you later."

The twins each lifted up their dominant hand in salutation and Jenni, ending up being ready first, turned to leave. Temporarily forgetting the "No magic in the halls" rule, she muttered a quiet _"Accio winter cloak"_ on the way to the doors.

It didn't take long to revert to the thoughts she had entertained before Ame had interrupted. Since she had first taken an interest in Severus Snape, she had developed an uncanny radar for any conversation in which he came up. In just three months, she thought she had gathered as much information about him as anyone could in as many years. She was all the more curious about what made that boy tick and much of her imagination occupied itself with running over how possible encounters with him could play out. Somehow, though, she never quite felt prepared to approach. She wouldn't have said she was afraid, per se, but some feeling of caution held her in check.

The whoosh of damp, chilly air across her face brought her out of herself and back to the world. Her cloak had long since come to her and she had put it on while walking. _Always people going in and out, in and out of these doors,_ she mused, herself very much included. Never content to stay in one place too long, that was Jenni.

The weather, though no longer wintry, was far from being pleasant. There was still snow on the ground in places, and the lake was still partially frozen. She hadn't consciously decided on a destination before coming out, but that was where her feet now led her, each step wary of soggy earth.

It was only when she got closer that she noticed the small figure crouched by the water's edge. She wasn't surprised to see another student taking advantage of the brief chance at getting out before noon classes started. However, this student had a silvery-blond head of long, straight hair and the green and gray scarf of a Slytherin trailing down over one slim shoulder. This gave Jenni the Ravenclaw some pause. Not because the other was in Slytherin—the two houses traditionally minded their own business where the other was concerned and thus remained non-aggressive—but because Jenni recognized her. There was only one person with hair like that, and she was Morganna Montaque.

Jenni barely deliberated before continuing her approach. She drew up just behind and to the side of Morganna and spoke softly:

"Hi. Mind if I…?"

Morganna looked up and shook her head. If she was surprised, she contained it well.

"Non… No, go ahead," she replied, her English lightly accented.

Jenni nodded in return and crouched down beside the smaller girl. She stared out across the frigid lake and into n-space, her consciousness still with the person next to her. Proximity took some of the chill off, she noticed.

Morganna spoke first.

"You are in Ravenclaw?" It was a statement wearing a question mark just for kicks.

"Yep," said Jenni, not turning her head. She sensed that Morganna wasn't looking at her anymore, either. It was one of those unspoken agreements of neutrality. "I have a sister in Hufflepuff. Twin, actually."

"Mm." Jenni felt Morganna nod. "I'm in Slytherin." The unspoken "of course" was implicit. "My family is all in France, except Auntie Winterburn, who I'm living with. You don't quite sound British," she commented after a pause.

Jenni grinned. "Ame and I were born in America. We moved back here about six years ago. I'm Jenni, by the way. Jennifer Robinson." She turned toward Morganna and extended her hand in friendship. She had wanted to do this for four years, and finally she did it. When Morganna also turned and shook it, giving her name in return, Jenni wondered why she had waited so long. It felt so natural it was almost as if they had already done it before.

Soon both of them were smiling sheepishly at the initial distance between them and exchanging information about themselves. Jenni only knew a few cousins on her mother's side and even less of her father's family—Robinsons dispersed widely—but Morganna had scores of aunts, uncles, and distant cousins that she listed without hesitation. Despite that, the Montaques and their offshoots were by and large pureblooded and had been as far back as Morganna could reckon. Jenni expressed an appropriate amount of real awe and neglected to comment on her own ancestry—or rather, the lack thereof. Ame's news had instilled her with at least that much caution.

Morganna didn't press the issue. Instead, the talk turned to friends, beginning with those left behind and coming around to their mutual ties with Lily Evans. It was strange, they decided, that they both knew Lily and yet had never come together before. Jenni confessed that she had meant to speak to Morganna ever since second year, but she never learned Morganna's thoughts on the matter. The blond girl was looking out across the lake and wearing a pleased sort of smile.

"What?" Jenni queried, looking around but not seeing what had caught Morganna's eye.

Morganna pointed obligingly. "Speaking of friends," said she, "Severus Snape is one of mine. Do you know him?"

Jenni saw them now: two boys poking around on the shore opposite from Morganna and herself. One she didn't recognize, but the other could only be Severus. No one else carried himself quite like that. _Coincidences abound,_ she thought.

"No, I don't know him," she said aloud. "I've heard a few things, though," she added.

"Well," Morganna began, but the ringing of the school bell cut her off.

Jenni pressed my lips together in annoyance. That was rotten timing on the bell's part. Well, perfect timing, really, because it was exactly on time, but that was beside the point. It was inconvenient. There was no opportunity for further talk because both girls needed their breath for the dash back up to the castle. Meeting up with the boys on the way was out of the question. Jenni and Morganna only paused at the doors long enough to hastily arrange a later get-together before going their separate ways, both of them now moving at a dead run. No one wanted to be late for class at Hogwarts.

* * *

Later actually came sooner than planned. Morganna and Severus still found that they made good study partners and came to the library to find Jenni with a newspaper spread across the table before her. The paper was courtesy of Ame. It had Jenni frowning at one article in particular: _Voldemort attacks again._ It seemed he was striking indirectly at the Ministry of Magic now, and he wasn't alone. The two most recent murders had been conducted simultaneously, and a singular witness—no doubt left alive for this very purpose—had reported faceless figures in black robes who had come in darkness and left under the sign of a green skull with a snake protruding from its mouth. 

Jenni was only too happy to look up when Morganna quietly hailed her.

"Hey! Jenni, hi."

Jenni saw that Morganna was waving at her as she approached, and smiled. Her green eyes darted over Severus excitedly, but with an effort she kept her voice under control.

"Hi, Morganna. … And, you're Severus, right?"

Morganna beamed, but Severus hovered a step behind her and looked Jenni over coolly.

"Hm. One of your friends, Morganna?" he said in a tone suggesting that he didn't think much of Morganna's friends as a rule. Jenni felt her eyebrows rise a fraction and Morganna turned to reply primly to Severus.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, she is. Meet Jennifer Robinson. Jenni, you don't mind if we sit here, do you?" The question was spoken sweetly.

Jenni opened her mouth to say "Of course not, go ahead," but Severus was quicker.

"May I remind you that we're here to study, not chat? There are lots of other tables that—"

"No, really, it's fine," Jenni jumped in, earning herself a surprised look from Morganna and a sharp glare from Snape. She didn't care. If she could circumvent the debate that seemed about to happen and get a few words in, she could deal with odd looks—even from Severus, who had the most piercing gaze she had ever seen (excepting, perhaps, her mother's).

"I won't bother you," Jenni went on, standing up to fold the newspaper. "What are you working on? Maybe I can help… or, at least learn along," she amended as Severus narrowed his eyes skeptically at her. "I'm in Ravenclaw, you know. I go for that sort of thing." This wasn't strictly true, but it gave her an excuse to smile, which bolstered her nerves and let the Slytherins know three things: one, she wasn't going to be intimidated by Severus; two, she was interested in getting along; and three—this was important—she could laugh at her house and herself.

Morganna clearly got the message, for she smiled again and took the chair across from Jenni's. "There, you see?" she spoke over her shoulder to Severus. "Jenni's all right! Come sit down. Please?"

"Hm." Severus leveled one more dark look at Jenni, but settled himself next to Morganna. "Fine. Just try not to make a nuisance of yourself… Robinson, was it?"

Not that he cared overmuch, Jenni thought, but she nodded.

"I don't suppose you have your Defense Against the Dark Arts textbook with you?"

"She can share—"Morganna started, but Severus put up a hand to silence her.

"No," Jenni admitted, beginning to feel just slightly resentful of the way Severus was taking over this encounter. "But then, I wasn't—"

"Then you had better come over here where you can see, hadn't you?" Severus interrupted. "No, not by Morganna, by me so I can talk to you properly—unless you've decided you're not serious about joining us, after all?" He watched her expectantly.

She looked right back for a moment, then determinedly sat herself down in the chair at the end of the table. Severus shifted slightly away and looked down, but said nothing. Jenni thought the point of all that had been to drive her off and that he was disappointed the ploy hadn't worked. A small smile of satisfaction touched her eyes.

"I am serious," she said. "I was just going to say I wouldn't have picked the library as a place to work on Defense Against the Dark Arts. It's a bit impractical to try to learn that stuff just by looking at words on a page, don't you think?"

Both Severus and Morganna gave Jenni a long look. Severus in particular seemed to be re-evaluating her character and, against his better judgment, liked what he saw. Morganna openly smiled in approval. Jenni waited for a reply.

"Yes," Severus said begrudgingly. "It is impractical to try to learn without doing. However, understanding the theory behind the magic never hurts, and anyway, we don't have much choice. Now, if you're both quite ready, look here on page 137…"

And so it went. Jenni surprised Severus several times by already understanding or else catching on very quickly to the things he was explaining, but she had always had a knack for the obscurities of the ways things worked. When Morganna or Jenni had trouble, though, Jenni was intrigued to learn that Severus was a very good teacher. He used clear, straightforward language and was quite direct in pointing out how one was thinking wrongly. Morganna was used to this and Jenni soon learned not to take offense. Overall, she found it to be the most productive study session she had ever had.

"Well," Jenni commented when Severus called a halt. "I'll never look at hats the same way again, that's for sure."

"Quite so," said Severus, giving her a sidelong look as he gathered his materials. "Morganna? You called for this. Do you feel more confidant now?"

"Yes, I do," Morganna affirmed in tones that suggested to me that she hadn't been interested in studying at all and was surprised to have benefited from the work. "Thank you, Severus. You're so patient with me." She smiled ingratiatingly up at him—all three of them were standing by this time and the older boy towered even over Jenni, who was by no means short for her age. He didn't seem so very imposing as he regarded Morganna, though.

"Hm. Don't mention it," he muttered. There was a bit of an awkward pause. Jenni shuffled her feet nervously and Severus turned quickly to pin her with a look. "Well. I suppose I'll be seeing you again… what was your name?"

"Jenni. Jennifer Robinson," she supplied.

"Robinson," Severus repeated thoughtfully. Perhaps Lily had mentioned her before and he was beginning to remember. "All right. Just don't think you can come running to me whenever you're stuck, understand? No one's going to hold your hand in the real world."

"You say that as if I would want them to," Jenni replied.

"Wouldn't you?" Severus' tone implied that anything else was contrary to his experience with young females like her.

"Not really," she said. "Asking questions is one thing, but clinging to the safe and familiar is another. I won't be bound like that." Hearing the words come out of her mouth was an eye-opener, but at the same time she knew they were true. That was why she could look Severus in the eye without a thought for his reputation and dare him to challenge her.

Severus stared right back, the expression in his black eyes shifting gradually from irritation to quiet amaze and even a little curiosity. Not many people would look at him like that, as if they were equals. They broke eye contact at the same time. Jenni turned to straighten the chair she had occupied and Severus cleared his throat for speech.

"Yes, well. I'm sure that's nice. Morganna? Let's go?" It was a command with only the inflection of a question. Severus turned himself and headed for the library doors.

"Bye, Jenni. See you later." Morganna smiled and waved a little, then hurried after Severus.

Jenni waved back silently and watched them go, fixing the entire encounter in her mind for future reference. Everything about Severus was worth noting, from the slightest way he moved to the way he and Morganna looked at each other when one thought the other wasn't paying attention. That made Jenni smile. She had learned a lot more than either of them knew that day.

* * *

Jenni thought she would have several days to contemplate that new knowledge outside their presence because of school. She couldn't imagine that their respective schedules would allow for much interaction, being in different years as well as different houses. However, less than a week passed before opportunity knocked. 

"Ill, you said?" Jenni would have stared wide-eyed at her sister if the concerned furrowing of her brows hadn't prevented it.

"Yes." Ame nodded, ensuring that her meaning got across in spite of the noise level in the corridor. Between second and third period, people were awake enough to talk up quite a storm, and Ame had a quiet voice. "He checked himself in this morning, before first period. I thought you'd want to know, since you've been talking about him."

By the look on her face, Ame still hadn't come to grips with her sister's latest friendships. Jenni couldn't say that she blamed her. Hufflepuffs tended to be favorite targets of Slytherin mischief, Ame among them more than once. Jenni sympathized with her twin, but she wasn't going to let that divert her.

"I still can't fathom how you get yourself up so early to clean bedpans, or whatever it is you do for Madam Pomfrey, but I'm glad you do," said Jenni. "Thanks. Do you think it would be all right if I stopped in later? Say, lunch time?" It was strange to thing of visiting Severus Snape in the hospital wing, but as soon as the notion entered Jenni's mind, it stuck there and wouldn't be altered.

"I… I guess so," Ame replied, sounding as uncertain as she looked. "For a little while—you know Madam Pomfrey doesn't like people bothering her patients; but, Jenni, is that a good idea? I mean… Severus Snape…" Now she was openly worried.

Jenni opened her mouth to assure Ame that she would be fine, but then she noticed how the hallway had become several decibels quieter and thought better of it.

"I'll have to talk to you later, Ame," she said quickly and patted her sister's shoulder before backing in the direction of her next class. "It'll be fine, trust me. See you!" With that, Jenni turned and bolted down the passageway, knowing Ame would do the same.

* * *

Compared to the noise level in the main corridors during the rush for lunch in the Great Hall, the quietude of the hospital wing was as the sound of falling snow to an avalanche. It was the kind of silence that did not want to be broken and had a way of informing a person that dire consequences would follow any disruption. It wasn't oppressive, but it was mindful. 

Jenni approached the door to the ward with her books held tightly to her chest and her shoulders slightly hunched against that feeling of being scrutinized by unseen eyes. She was not doing anything wrong, and she had every right to be here (or so she told herself), but she couldn't help feeling a little apprehensive. She wondered if she was supposed to knock before going in, or would that disturb people who might be resting? She disengaged one arm and simply tried the door. It opened easily without so much as a squeak. Jenni swallowed and stepped in.

The feeling of watchful silence intensified but, much to Jenni's relief, Madam Pomfrey did not immediately swoop down on her and throw her out by the ear. In fact, she didn't seem to be there at all, which was unsettling in itself.

Oh well. Jenni had come here for a purpose and she wasn't about to be turned from it now. A woman in a painting on the wall gave her a reproachful look, but she resettled her books and set off along the row of beds. Most of them were empty, but a few were screened off to give their occupants some privacy. Not surprisingly, she found Severus in the farthest one.

She had been moving so carefully he didn't notice her at first, and she paused to look closely at him for a moment. He was turned slightly away, attention given wholly to a book with a title Jenni couldn't make out. Severus' black hair was unkempt and currently pushed roughly behind his ear, exposing his paler-than-usual profile with its prominent aquiline nose, sharp cheekbones with hollows underneath, and thin lips pressed into a grim line. That was the face people hated and sometimes feared. Jenni looked further. There was more there. Severus' brow, though damp with perspiration now, was straight and noble, but creased with some thought or care. In this unguarded moment, his fever-bright black eyes seemed to hold a well of untapped feelings, at once frightful and so very human.

There was a perfectly normal, feeling human being in there. Suddenly, nothing was more important than digging him out before he suffocated. Jenni had a creeping feeling that the world would weep if that person was allowed to die.

She opened her mouth to speak at last, but Severus had become aware of her presence by then.

"Are you going to stand there and stare all day?" he demanded in flat tones, not looking up from his book until the last. Only his eyes moved, though, and he peered up at Jenni from under his sinuous black eyebrows.

Jenni failed to be intimidated. All his guards had gone back up, but she had seen past them if only for one second, and she was not about to forget. She couldn't be anxious anymore. She smiled.

"No. I didn't mean to stare. I'm sorry."

"Hm." His eyebrows rose and his chin tilted up a fraction. "Well, what do you want, then—Robinson?"

She nodded confirmation of her name. "I just came to see you—see how you're doing," she amended to avoid the logical retort to the original phrasing: "Well, you've seen, now go away."

"Um, could I sit down?" To every bed in the ward was a chair for use by Madam Pomfrey or the few visitors who happened to gain admittance. Jenni intended to stay a while and she wanted the weight of her books off her arms.

Severus stared at her for a good while without so much as blinking, but just when she was beginning to think she would get a leisurely lunch after all, he closed his book and shifted to a more upright position, muttering his thoughts aloud.

"Why not? Not like I've anything better to do at the moment. This could go somewhere interesting…"

Jenni didn't think she was supposed to hear the last part. She settled herself in the chair and let it go. Severus eyed her expectantly, though he didn't expect much.

"So…" Jenni began weakly, but it was enough to kick her brain into gear. "I heard you were up here from my sister, Ame. I guess you must've seen her this morning?"

"Ah. Yes." This satisfied something for Severus. "I recall thinking your hair wasn't that short the other day in the library. Identical twins, I suppose?"

"Yup. Well, what they call mirror twins, actually. I'm right-handed, she's left-handed, and so on. But that's beside the point. … You don't look so good, but you sound all right. Is it just a fever, then?" She fought down an urge to lay a hand against his forehead and wondered where it had come from. Perhaps one couldn't care for a person's soul without caring for their entire being.

"A wretched, bloody fever," Severus growled in accord. "I hate it. It's such a waste of time. Do you know, I've been reading this book all morning and haven't retained half of it?" He stopped there, looking bewildered at having spoken so fully.

Jenni was privately delighted.

"I know exactly what you mean," she replied seriously. "All this time free of class, and you can't do a thing with it. No fun at all."

Severus shifted uncomfortably. "Yes, well. Fun doesn't exactly come into it, does it? At least I'm missing Divination. That is more of a waste of time than this."

"Oh, I don't know. Like most things, I think it depends on how you look at it." Jenni smiled at him and received a vaguely suspicious look in return.

"Do you honestly buy into that drivel?" Severus challenged her. "That's not very intelligent-like for a Ravenclaw," he added pointedly.

"It's not all drivel," Jenni said. "See, I don't think it's really about the magic."

Severus raised an eyebrow at this, but made no indication that she should not go on. She continued.

"It's more about getting in touch with yourself. You can't really understand the world unless you have something to relate it to, and if you can't relate it to yourself, well, where are you?"

"I don't see what this has to do with crystal balls and tea leaves," Severus growled.

"Ever heard of a Rorschach test?"

He shook his dark head slowly. Of course, he came from one of those all-wizarding families. He wouldn't have had access to Muggle psychology, but Jenni's mother worked in the field and kept resources at home.

"Well," Jenni explained, "people's minds work in different ways, right? The Rorschach test determines some of the variables by asking people to tell the examiner what they see in random splotches of ink on a page. Different kinds of answers mean different things. Now, take tea leaves, for example," she pressed on, leaving a deeper explanation in favor of maintaining Severus' interest. "It's the same principle, only you have to figure out the meaning for yourself. You're right, books won't help you do that. The trick is to take what you see and ask yourself what it means to you. You might not get the future, but I guarantee you'll gain an insight into your present," she concluded with a smile. Now, what would Severus' reaction be?

He was a minute or so in responding. He looked particularly broody as he thought about this alternate take on things, like someone patiently working on a sandcastle while the incoming tide washed his progress away again and again.

"That's… interesting," he said at length. "But what if all you see is a pile of soggy leaves at the bottom of an ugly teacup?" He looked sidelong at Jenni.

"Well, you know what they say. Those that can't make a career out of their profession often go into teaching. I think you'd make a grand Professor," she added with a mildly teasing look. She wasn't prepared to answer his question seriously. Not yet.

To her great surprise, Severus barked a short, dry laugh. "Ha! You think I'd come back to this hellhole once I'd got out? Over my rotting corpse! Robinson, I think that's the funniest thing I've heard in a week."

Was that…? Yes, there was the faintest of smiles about those thin, colorless lips. It didn't come close to Severus' eyes, but Jenni wasn't going to quibble about technicalities. That was a smile, she had put it there, and it wasn't malicious or sadistic, either.

"They also say that laughter is the best medicine," she told him. "Listen, I'm going to go now, but get better soon, all right? Otherwise I'll have to come back, and I'm not sure I could actually get away with it."

Severus took it the wrong way and snorted derisively. "Why not? I'm not in much of a position to stop you, am I?"

"No," nor would he ever want to, if things went the way Jenni hoped they would, "but Madam Pomfrey is. I have no idea why she's not here now, but I have a feeling she'll be back to catch me if I don't get going." She reordered her books and got to her feet.

"It didn't occur to you that the good healer eats, like other normal people?" Severus drawled indolently, giving every appearance of enjoying the chance to bait the Ravenclaw girl.

Jenni blinked. No, it had not. However, she wasn't going to give Severus the satisfaction of having that as the last word. He might be ill, but if he could still manage to come up with snarky remarks like that, she didn't have to sympathize so very much.

"All the more reason for me to get going before she finishes, or we'll meet in the hallway anyhow," she said, smiling to take any confrontational edges off her words. She did want to be a friend and not just an amusing pest. "Severus… I'll see you later. Get well!"

With that final admonition, she turned and headed out of the infirmary wing and to the Great Hall. She did not meet Madam Pomfrey on the way.

_Perhaps I attributed too much significance to that conversation at the time. However, it opened a door for me into his world, and the door never quite closed._


	9. Part Eight: I Solemnly Swear

**Part Eight – I Solemnly Swear**

"_Professor_ Severus Snape? What a joke!" Lucius Malfoy took the opportunity to roll on the dorm room floor in a fit of laughter.

"That's what she said," Severus replied with an amused smirk. Lucius really was an idiot. "That, and some prattle about Divinity actually being insightful."

"And this was who?" inquired Aeolus de Salis, who was sprawled over one of the chairs in the room. Aeolus was an average-sized young man with untidy chestnut hair and blue eyes, and tended to be 'big brother' to his dorm mates. They all gave him hell for it, of course, but it was generally accepted that Aeolus knew best. Sometimes they even listened to him.

"Just some girl," Severus answered with an unaffected shrug. "A friend of Morganna's. Shut up, Lucius."

"I didn't say anything!" Lucius sat up indignantly.

"But you were going to."

"I'd like to see you prove it."

"Malfoy! Snape!" Aeolus broke in. "Both of you shut the hell up, and Lucius, get off the floor before the native crawlies decide to make you an honorary dust bunny."

"For your information, de Salis, I am already Lord of the dust bunnies and High Chancellor to the pile under your bed," Lucius rejoined with an air of haughty dignity, arms folded high across his chest.

"All hail, Lord of the Dung Heap," Severus sneered, and threw a pillow at Lucius' smirking face. It caught the pale boy flush on the kisser. Severus and Aeolus laughed while Lucius shook the dazed look out of his eyes and glared at them.

"You'll both live to regret that," he informed them sullenly. "And you can have your God-awful greasy pillow back, for starters." He stood up and whipped the pillow at Severus. In his anger, his aim was off and Severus easily avoided it.

"For Chrissake, give it a rest, Malfoy," he enjoined. "You're not any—"

He had been about to explain how Lucius wasn't in any way superior to the rest of them except in the arsehole department, but he was interrupted by the entrance of Evan Rosier, their thickset fourth roommate. Evan balked slightly at the sight of Lucius in a wrath, but the taller boy turned away to sit down on his bed in disgust. Evan shrugged and turned to Severus and Aeolus.

"If anyone cares, I overheard the Fabulous Freaksome on the way from the library. Sounds like Loopy Lupin is coming up on that time of the month." His news delivered, Evan went to rummage through his trunk for some article Severus was sure he didn't want to know about.

"Great!" Aeolus said sincerely. "The school will have a few days' peace."

"I wonder," murmured Severus. It was true that Potter's gang tended to lie low for the days surrounding Lupin's monthly bouts of illness. Severus supposed he ought to take that as a blessing and be content, but he had strong suspicions that there was more to it than a show of support for a sick friend. Lucius didn't stop being a prat when Severus was ill. Why should Potter—Lord High Prat Potter—change for Lupin? And if it was something that would see them expelled...

"I'd really like to know where that retard goes every month," Severus finished with a growl, voicing the thought for what had to be about the hundredth time.

Aeolus and Evan didn't pay him any mind, but across the room, Lucius looked up and turned to face the three of them.

"You know, Snape, that's actually not a bad idea," he said. There was an unpleasant glint in his gray eyes and a smirk was spreading across his face.

Severus stared at him. "I hesitate to ask... but, what is going through your pointy head, Lucius?"

The smirk expanded to a grin and Lucius turned to Evan. "Rosier! Where did you hear them talking?"

"I dunno. Some corridor on the fourth floor. There might have been a statue."

"Could you find it again?"

"Absolutely." Evan nodded. He was now sitting on his trunk and Lucius had his full attention. "But why? You think they'd go there again?"

"They might," the blond agreed. "And we might learn some things that might interest certain people, eh, Severus?" Lucius' grin turned knowing.

Severus couldn't help but respond in kind. "Right."

The creak of wood caught his attention and he turned to see Aeolus straightening in his chair. "You're very quiet, de Salis," Severus commented.

"I'm not sure I like this," Aeolus said carefully. "There's something wrong somewhere. It's too convenient."

Severus opened his mouth to reply, but Lucius spoke faster.

"Give over, old man! Something goes our way for once and you just have to nay-say it. Well, don't! Sev, you're with me, right? Evan?"

Both responded in the affirmative, though Severus never took his delving eyes off Aeolus. For Severus' part, he shared his dorm mate's concern. However, he was not going to pass up a chance to strike back at his tormentors, whatever the risk.

"Good. Evan, you find that corridor and let us know exactly where it is," Lucius was saying when Severus tore his gaze from Aeolus. "Then we can all keep our ears open in shifts—but for Chrissake, don't _look_ like you're listening. I can just imagine you with your ear to the wall, Evan." Lucius affected a high, squeaky voice: "'Oh, don't mind me, Mr. Potter! I'm just getting friendly with Mr. Wall and not eavesdropping at all!"

"Shut your mouth, Malfoy," Evan snapped. "If I were that stupid, d'ya think I'd be here telling you things now and not hexed to the next millennium? I don't think so. So shut your damn mouth." He stood up in a huff and stalked to the door, nodding to Aeolus as he went. He paused by Severus long enough to mutter, "See you, Snape. I'm off to get friendly with more walls." Then he was gone. Aeolus looked between Severus and Lucius, then abruptly got up and followed Evan.

"Oh, bravo, Malfoy," Severus drawled sarcastically as soon as the dorm door slammed shut. "You're just pissing everyone off today, aren't you? What the hell is your problem? Evan may not be the brightest crayon in the box, but he's smarter than you if you expect any of us to put up with this kind of bullshit much longer." Severus glared icily at his... friend.

"Ah, Snape, you're breaking my heart," Lucius replied in a similar drawl. He swung his legs up on the bed and let himself recline with his arms folded under his head. "You just hope that Rosier comes through for us."

* * *

Evan did. 

"Okay, so it was a mirror, not a statue," he reported with a resentful glare at Lucius, "but I definitely heard them again. You're going to love this, Sev."

Evan, Severus and Lucius were in the dormitory again. Aeolus was nowhere to be found. He had sworn an oath to himself to have nothing to do with this scheme and was taking pains to avoid it.

"Go on," Severus said eagerly, ignoring the obnoxious shortening of his name.

"You know that great gnarly tree that clobbered Gudgeon last year?"

Severus nodded. Davey Gudgeon had been in his last term at Hogwarts that year and determined to go out with a bang. Unfortunately, that bang had come down on his head and nearly lost him an eye when he tried to get by the Whomping Willow. It had been a novelty to everyone in his year and up, but for Severus' class, it had come with the territory. Everyone knew about the Whomping Willow.

Evan continued excitedly: "Well, I heard Black reminding someone called Wormtail about 'the big knot above the crevice.' It sounds like there's a secret room or passage down there, right under that tree! The knot freezes it so you can get through!"

"Bloody hell!" Severus' eyes were wide in astonishment and glittering with cold fury. "It's so flaming obvious you'd never look twice at it!"

"You know what that means." If Severus looked angry, Lucius' tone could have curdled milk and was nearly as pleasant as that substance. Severus and Evan could hear the disgusted sneer on his face even before they turned to look at him. "That senile, Muggle-loving old freak, Dumbledore, has something to do with it—everything to do with it. _God,_ I'd like to see him sacked!" Lucius drove his fist into his mattress in his passion for that wish.

Severus looked to Evan, expecting to see a reflection of the usual weary resignation to Lucius' moronic antics in the other boy's ovoid face, but Evan was nodding slowly to himself and not paying attention. Severus scowled.

"So, now we know about Lupin's rathole," he said pointedly so as to draw his friends' attention back to the matter at hand. "How do you propose we go about exposing it, hm?" The last was directed at Lucius. Evan wasn't a plotter by nature.

Lucius' gray eyes locked on Severus', and the blond smirked condescendingly.

"An eye-witness account would be just the thing to begin with, don't you think? You'll go, of course, Severus. I'd hate to deprive you of the opportunity to revenge yourself first-hand."

"Of course," Severus grated through clenched teeth. _Damn you and your fucking superiority complex, Malfoy._ Just because he was right didn't give him the authorization to be so damn smug about it. "You're so _considerate,_ Lucius. Might I ask where you'll be when I'm no doubt sneaking about illegally, after-hours?"

"Making sure you don't get caught, of course," Lucius replied smoothly. "Don't worry about your back, I'll see that it's covered." He resumed a dictatorial tone. "Evan, you've made a good spy so far. If you can pull it off again, Severus can catch Lupin in the act, whatever it may be. Watch the Gryffindors. When Lupin leaves, you let Severus and me know about it. Then we'll see what Dumbledore is covering up!"

* * *

It was a full moon that night. Later, Severus would torture himself with the knowledge that nothing would have happened as it did if any of them had attended to that simple fact. He himself in particular should have seen the warning for what it was. However, he had only one thing on his mind as he crossed the faintly illuminated grounds: 

_I'm finally going to get Potter!_

Evan had been late in reporting Remus' departure ("I'm sorry! Peeves was hanging around, and I didn't feel like getting caught!"), so Severus was in a hurry and not attending to the sky. It was dusk when he slipped outside, narrowly avoiding Madam Pomfrey on her way back to the hospital wing.

Severus burned with feverish anticipation as he moved through the shadows, shadow-like himself in his black cloak. He was following in Lupin's footsteps toward the umbral figure of the Whomping Willow, and it was Lupin who was most directly involved with whatever illicit activities were taking place beyond, but what concerned Lupin invariably concerned Potter. At the very least, Potter was guilty of knowing about it and saying nothing—withholding evidence, as it were. Now the whole lot were finally going to get what they deserved!

The moon was just rising when he reached the foot of the Willow. Blending with the darkness there, the only thing that could have hidden him more effectively would have been an Invisibility Cloak. The Willow, however, wasn't fooled. The branches of the tree creaked ominously as Severus searched for a stick to reach the knot that would paralyze it so he could slip through after Lupin. One limb took a swing at him, and he dodged only just in time to avoid a concussion. Still, he took a smarting blow to his left shoulder and hissed a curse as he dropped to the ground.

His right hand shot out to check the fall. It came down on a dead branch long enough to suit his needs.

Severus didn't pause to wonder at his apparent luck. He seized the branch and pushed it home. The Whomping Willow froze immediately. Severus grinned in triumph and cast the stick away. He didn't need it anymore. Ignoring the throbbing ache in his shoulder, he got down on his hands and knees and hurried through the great gap in the tree's roots.

The next thing he knew, he was at the bottom of a slope of earth inside a low tunnel. He learned the hard way that he had to crouch to avoid bumping his head when he stood. With that in mind, he pulled out his wand and lit it (_"Lumos!"_), then hurried along the tunnel. He found that it was long and he had plenty of time to think about what was going to happen at the other end. A feral grin spread across his face as he imagined emerging just in time to catch Lupin in the act of something illegal—smuggling goods, perhaps. If Severus was lucky, Potter and Black would somehow be there, as well, aiding and abetting. If it was bad enough, he could see them packed off to Azkaban, and everyone would have to acknowledge that he, Severus Snape, had done a great service to the Wizarding World. He would be a hero! He could leave his father's cursed reputation behind and start over. He...

The ground began to rise, and he came to the end of the tunnel. He could hear some kind of commotion from above, but there was a turn before the tunnel exit and he couldn't see out right away. Slowly, so as not to draw attention to himself, he crept around the bend and raised his wand just through the small opening. The thin beam of light fell on a thing that made Severus' eyes go wide in real fear.

The creature had all the appearance of a rangy young wolf but for a few small differences that Severus recognized immediately, even shocked stiff as he was. This beast had a longer muzzle, for one; the ears were taller, and the eyes held a spark of evil intent unknown to the animal kingdom. This thing, this werewolf, had a special preference for the taste of human flesh. It had been in a ravenous frenzy, breaking up anything that wasn't bolted down and even gnawing its own limbs for lack of anything better. Now, it paused. Its keen nose had picked up the scent of human blood, and any second now it was going to turn, to focus right on Severus, and it would be over before he could utter the first syllable of a curse to save himself. This was it... this was the end...

_"Get down, you idiot!"_

Suddenly, a strong hand seized Severus' cloak from behind and pulled him backward hard enough that his legs came out from under him and he landed on his bottom. The hand didn't let go. Rather, another one latched on and the pair proceeded to drag him down the slope and into the tunnel proper. With a jolt, it hit home to Severus that he knew that voice, and loathed it.

"Get your hands off me!" he snarled, and thrashed madly to break free of the grip on his robes. "Get your bloody hands the hell off me!"

"Shut your pie-hole, Snape!" hissed James Potter. He didn't let go, but redoubled his efforts to move them both along. "You want to get killed? Shut up and get going!"

As much as he resented it, Severus didn't need to be told twice. He got his feet under him and, with James' hand firmly at the nape of his cloak, hurried back through the tunnel. At the end, James shoved him ahead and made him exit first through the Willow's roots.

"Reach around for the knot," James instructed.

"And what are you—"Severus began, but James interrupted him with another hard push.

"Don't be more thick than you have to! _Go!"_

Severus growled, but turned and scrambled up the slope and out.

If Severus had any thoughts of leaving James behind and running for the first Professor he came across, they were short-lived. Once beyond the reach of the frozen Whomping Willow, the impact of the night's events caught up with him and demanded that he stop to process them. He doubled over, panting with his hands braced on his bent knees. The Willow, guarding a tunnel... the tunnel must lead to the Shrieking Shack... Remus Lupin, a werewolf... saved by James Potter... _saved by James Potter..._

A minute or so later, the Gryffindor crawled out of the tunnel and jogged toward Severus. The Willow creaked and groaned to life again in his wake.

"You're lucky," said James, taking a hold of Severus again and propelling him toward the castle. "He didn't follow us. _Jays,_ Snape, I knew you were nosy, but I didn't think you were suicidally stupid, too!"

"Let _go_ of me!" Severus raged, shoving Potter with all his might in order to break away. "For your information," he continued in a low, dangerous voice, "it was your friend Black who let Lupin's secret slip. If we're going to discuss inferior intellects, let's begin with his!"

"He did that on purpose," James said coldly. "If I hadn't found out about it when I did, you'd be dead or worse by now."

The two glared at each other.

"You're only covering your own arse," Severus said. "Dumbledore wouldn't like it if someone got killed because of one of your stupid pranks, would he?"

"No, he wouldn't," James said evenly. "Listen, this wasn't my idea. Don't get any delusions about that. I thought Black was joking until tonight, and believe me, I wasn't happy!"

"Oh, please," Severus sneered. "Get off the unicorn, Potter! You're no hero; you're not noble. I'd bet Galleons to Knuts you're jealous you didn't think of it yourself. Whether you're covering for yourself or your ape Black or your pet wolf now, it makes no difference. When I tell the headmaster about this, you're all going to be expelled or worse!"

"You keep telling yourself that, Snape. If it makes you feel better about yourself, fine. Now get moving!" He plunged forward and took Severus by the shoulder with one hand, turning him, then planted the heel of his other hand between Severus' shoulder blades and shoved him hard toward the castle.

"_Don't touch me!"_ Severus shouted, forgetting that he was out of his dorm after curfew. He brought his wand to bear and faced Potter. "God damn it, if you touch me again you're going to lose your fucking hands!"

"'Ere! What's all this, then?"

The gravelly voice that surprised them, rather than being wrathful, was full of sadistic glee. Argus Filch hated Snape and Potter indiscriminately. The chance to take both of them in at once was the reward of a lifetime.

Severus turned slowly to face this new foe. The caretaker had a cracked grin on his face as he made his way across the grass. Behind him jogged Peter Pettigrew, shooting what Severus supposed to be apologetic looks at James. There was no time to sneer. Filch crossed his arms high on his chest and peered triumphantly at them in turn.

"Well well, boys. This is a pretty mess, isn't it?" His expression faltered when his eyes touched on Severus' wand, at the boy's side now but still held aggressively point-up. "'Ere, I'll be having that, now. Give it up!"

Severus came dangerously close to forgetting himself and delivering the wand, still encased in his fist, to Filch's head. This was not something he needed.

"His, too," he said instead with a sharp gesture at James.

Filch opened his mouth to reprimand Severus for his cheek, but James was quicker. He took his wand out in a flash and proffered it to the caretaker. Under the expectant gaze of three pairs of eyes, Severus had no choice but to do the same. Filch seized both wands and stuffed them in some dark recess of his coat.

"Now then," said Filch. "The headmaster is waiting for you in his office. Let's not keep the nice man waiting." He beckoned to the boys, spun on his heel, and started back toward the castle.

Severus followed numbly, not thinking of anything except putting one foot in front of the other. Pettigrew fell in at James' side, taking two steps for each of James' determined strides.

"Hey, look... sorry about this. I did what you said, though," Peter reported. "We went straight to Dumbledore. We almost didn't get in before _he_ turned up—"the boy nodded at Filch—"but you know, I think Dumbledore sees everything." His tone was awed.

Severus rolled his eyes.

"Good, Peter, that's good," said James. "Now, can I ask you something seriously?"

"What?"

"Shut up?"

Peter missed a step in sudden hurt, but picked up his pace again and trotted along sullenly. They crossed into the castle at this point. His shoes (hastily donned, untied), scuffed against the stone floor, making Severus' fingers itch to silence him for good. The Slytherin had almost laughed at James' abrupt treatment of him, but that would have been a grievous tactical error.

If nothing else, the long walk was serving to allow Severus time to collect his scattered wits.

In time they came to the second floor and the stone gargoyle that guarded the entrance to the headmaster's chambers. Filch gave the three boys the evil eye before he muttered the password. (Severus caught the second word: "humbug.") The gargoyle obligingly sprang aside, revealing the wooden spiral stairs that carried all four up to Dumbledore's office.

The spectacular array of the office was lost on Severus as he stepped in. There, pacing in front of the claw-footed desk with his head down and hands in pockets, was Sirius Black. Severus' lips curled in hatred and his wand hand twitched. But Filch had taken his wand. He felt naked and alone, and he hated the Gryffindors even more for it.

"Not dead, then?" Sirius had stopped pacing and deigned to take notice. "Fantastic." He turned to face the desk and, more specifically, the person seated behind it. "Can I have my detention and go now, Headmaster?"

Dumbledore didn't answer him right away.

"Thank you, Mister Filch," he said. "That will be all."

"Sir?" Filch didn't want to be dismissed before the punishments were doled out.

"That will be all."

The caretaker stiffened, drew a breath, and left with a nasty parting look at James and Severus.

When Filch was gone, the four boys all looked at Dumbledore. The old man was resplendent in a red silk brocade dressing gown, white hands calmly folded across the desk top. He looked back at them over the tops of his half-moon spectacles and did not speak for a moment, but considered them.

"... Well. What do you boys have to say for yourselves?"

Though Dumbledore's voice was quiet, they all flinched involuntarily. Severus was the first to recover, taking an aggressive step toward the desk.

"Sir, it's not my fault! They deliberately misled me, tried to get me killed—"

But he was overridden by the offended protests of James and Sirius, James trying to explain that he had nothing to do with it, Sirius declaring Severus' nosy ways and how it was, too, his own fault. Several paintings woke up and complained bitterly of the noise. Peter stood behind the other three boys with his mouth hanging open.

"But, sir, a werewolf! How can you allow it?" Severus was close to screaming at the headmaster. "It could attack anyone, it nearly killed me—!"

Dumbledore, who sat in the middle of this onslaught like a rock in the eye of a hurricane, now raised his hands and fixed Severus with a look that made them all quiet down, save a few disgruntled mutters from the paintings.

"I know," he said. "I have been aware of Remus' condition since his acceptance into this school. I believe that such an intermittent, predictable and controllable malady should not deny a _person_ the chance to live as one. As for your close encounter, it will not go unpunished."

He let his hands settle back to the desk, pale autumn leaves coming to rest. The boys waited quietly to learn what he meant by punishment. Severus' heart ached in his chest. They should be expelled, all of them, him too if it meant the last of Potter and Black. He never hated them more than in this moment.

"You will understand," said Dumbledore, "that I do not wish to call attention to the incident. Remus Lupin does not deserve additional consequences for a thing that is not under his control. Therefore, each of you will serve a detention for being out of your bed at night, each of you will lose five house points—"Sirius began to protest on behalf of Gryffindor, but Dumbledore smoothly sailed over him—"but none of you... none of you will speak of what you have seen." Again, his cool blue gaze was fixed especially on Severus. "Is that understood?"

So, that was it. The punishment was silence, and it stung Severus worse than the loss of one hundred house points ever could. He had to bear everything he had gone through alone, and he would have no justice. Did Dumbledore realize the sheer cruelty of what he had done? Did he think that Severus' tortured history made him the more capable of handling it?

The Gryffindors, of course, were elated by their good fortune. They knew they had the better part of the deal.

"We'll swear it," said James. He raised his right hand and looked Dumbledore squarely in the face. "I solemnly swear... I won't say a word."

"I solemnly swear," echoed Sirius and Peter. A nervous grin wormed across Peter's face and vanished.

All eyes turned to Severus, who stood with his arms stiff at his sides, nostrils flaring with the effort of containing each breath so that he wouldn't explode in mad rage. How could they ask him to do this? How could they? They didn't even have the decency to appear concerned that he wouldn't play this stupid game, not even Dumbledore, who should have known better—perhaps did know better, and did it anyway.

It was the thought of Morganna that clinched his decision. He would not want her to know of his humiliation at the hands of James Potter. He did not want anyone to know about that. There would be time later for revenge, and the thought allowed him to meet Dumbledore's eyes and speak clearly.

"I... solemnly... swear."

_The oath cost him everything._


	10. Part Nine: Secrets

**Part Nine – Secrets**

The pranks didn't die down in the days following the incident. If anything, they intensified. Most of the school didn't suspect a thing. This was, of course, the intention. However, at least one person wasn't fooled.

Lily Evans considered herself an expert on all things Potter and she saw the cover-up for what it was. In a few days, she "prefected" James into divulging the secret.

Morganna had never seen her friend so angry.

"I swear, I'm never going to speak to any of them again!" declared the fiery red-head. She sat down heavily on the lake shore and attacked the sandwiches she had brought from lunch, venting between bites. "I can't believe anyone could be so stupid! And poor Remus. He must feel awful."

"But what happened?" Morganna broke in. She was completely dumbfounded. Severus had hardly spoken two words to anyone since the night of the full moon, but that wasn't exactly abnormal behavior for him. "You must tell me now, or else why drag me all the way down here to talk alone?"

Lily gave the Slytherin a long look.

"If you breathe a word of this to anyone else, I'll find some excuse to report you," Lily warned earnestly before launching into a version of James' account. Even modified by Lily's good sense it came across as more heroic in nature than Morganna suspected was true. Nevertheless, she was aghast by the end.

"That's awful!"

"I know!" Lily responded. "Couldn't you just kill the lot of them? Except Remus?"

Morganna nodded distractedly. This certainly shed light on Severus' dark mood, even if he hadn't come quite so close to being disemboweled as the Gryffindor report made out. Being rescued by James Potter was more than enough of an explanation.

Lily eyed her sharply. "Don't try to defend Severus, Morganna. He's my friend, too, but if he'd just minded his own business this never would have happened. You know it."

"I know," she said somewhat irritably, not meeting Lily's eyes. Her own were clouded beneath close-knit silvery brows. "It was just a rotten trick, that's all. I need to talk to him," she resolved.

"Better you than me," Lily said vehemently. "I'd rather have his scalp, maybe with his stupid head attached. If Sirius or James do anything out of order in my presence, they'll wish Professor Dumbledore had expelled them."

Morganna believed her. Lily continued to malign each boy until it was time to get back to the school for afternoon classes. They walked in silence and Morganna began to think about how to approach Severus.

By nature, she wasn't very devious. She could emotionally blackmail a person 'till the cows came home, but it wasn't quite the same thing. She felt certain it was going to take a measure of real cunning to achieve her ends. She fretted over it for the rest of the day, convincing her professors that something was wrong with her but failing to come up with a plan of action. In her last period, she managed to assure herself with the knowledge that Severus trusted her more than anyone else in the world. He was her friend. He would talk to her.

That evening, Morganna went to Severus where he was working in the Slytherin common room. The gloomy aura of single-minded focus might have been placed about him by a spell, it was so strong. Morganna swallowed and forced a cheerful smile onto her face.

"Hey, Severus! What are you working on?" she asked, affecting interest by peering over his shoulder. The shoulder quivered as he scratched at the parchment in front of him with his quill.

"Not now, Morganna. I'm working," Severus replied distantly. He didn't look up.

Morganna frowned. Well, if he wasn't going to look at her, why bother smiling?

"Yes, now," she corrected him. "You've been acting strange all week. I want to know what's going on." And that was the plain truth.

Severus stopped writing and very deliberately laid the quill on the worktop.

"Morganna, I am very busy. There's nothing going on that a little peace won't fix. Please go away."

Not once did he look at her. Her lips pursed. She didn't like this treatment one little bit.

"Not until you talk to me," she declared. "Tell me what happened and—"

It was just as well that Severus cut her off when he did. Morganna couldn't think of anything she could have said to conclude the thought that would have been true.

He stood up precipitously so that Morganna had to back up to avoid being clipped on the chin by his shoulder. Even now he didn't turn around but continued to face directly away.

"I do not have time for this," he said in a tightly controlled growl. "I will ask you one last time: go away and leave me alone."

"What if I said no?"

His back stiffened with an indrawn breath.

"Good evening, Morganna."

It seemed that he gathered his things and vanished into the boys' dormitory in one movement. Morganna was left standing with her mouth in an open pout and her ears ringing with the finality of Severus' words. She could also hear whispering behind her in the common room and felt certain her fellow Slytherins were quietly laughing at her. It took a great deal of effort for her not to cry. It was bad enough that she had failed to console her friend, but people had _seen_ it. That was nigh unbearable.

She soon followed Severus' example and retired to her dorm for the night. She didn't sleep right away. Her thoughts were frenzied again and she could only come to one conclusion: tomorrow she would have to ask for help.

* * *

She found it in the library. It was a bit disconcerting at first to see Jenni sitting head to head with her twin sister (Morganna had heard of Ame but not met her until today), but she sorted out which was who quickly enough. Sylvia Blackridge was with them also, but all three were wearing their school robes. Morganna wanted the brown-haired Ravenclaw. 

"Jenni?"

All three girls looked up. Ame quickly got the idea that she wasn't wanted. She smiled apologetically and moved off. Sylvia looked between Jenni and Morganna, sighed, and followed suit. Morganna slid uneasily into the chair Ame had vacated.

"Yes?" Jenni prompted. She was curious and mildly confused.

Morganna got straight to the point. "I need some advice," she said, then braced for whatever the reaction would be.

Jenni sat up straighter, more curious and paying utmost attention. She waited for Morganna to elaborate, but not for long. Morganna was relieved to find Jenni a good listener and proceeded to make good on her fortune.

"It's Severus. He's in a mood. Obviously something is wrong, but you know how he is. I can't get him to talk to me."

Jenni thought about this before she responded. It was interesting, she thought, that Morganna should come to her for advice about Severus when Morganna had known him so much longer than she. What was going on? Jenni would wonder more about that later, though. Right now she would do her best to help Morganna work this out. Perhaps she would be rewarded with more information.

"Okay... what happened when you tried before? Did you try more than once?"

Morganna outlined her singular but persistent attempt, feeling rather silly. It wasn't something she planned on repeating to anyone, ever. This one time she supposed it was a necessary evil.

"Hmm."

Jenni grew thoughtful again, staring into the middle distance as she played the encounter through her mind and projected into the next one. Morganna gave her silence. This thinking was exactly what she wanted her friend to do. She could almost hear the wheels turning in Jenni's head. However, the next question surprised her.

"Do you think he might snap at you if you tried again?"

Morganna blinked. "Maybe. I don't want that, though. Do I?" she asked uncertainly.

"Maybe," Jenni replied with her particular mischievous half-smile. "This is just me talking, of course—you know him better than I do—but if it were me..."

Morganna listened intently in her turn as Jenni spoke. For a plan that she had just invented in that minute, it was very precise. It was also a bit crazy to Morganna's ears, but then, she had not thought of it. Of course an idea that wasn't hers would sound a little foreign. That, she hoped, meant it would work.

For Jenni's part, she had imagined such a tactic working on Severus' type for a long time. She wished she could be there to see it work, but she would just have to be happy knowing that Morganna would pull it off instead.

"The worst that can happen if it doesn't work is that you'll be back where you started, I think," Jenni said. "Maybe it would be harder to approach him again about... whatever this is about... but that would be the case anyway, yes?"

Morganna agreed outwardly, but there was a shadow in her eyes that said it was more likely that Severus would simply refuse to talk to her at all for a while if she failed to reach him again. She wasn't sure she could bear that, but she didn't have any other options but to try Jenni's plan. She would just have to hope and trust that Ravenclaw logic was everything it was reputed to be.

When she got up and left the library, Jenni remained seated and permitted herself to brood deeply over what had transpired. Unlike most of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff houses, she was not totally insensitive to the strange mood between Slytherin and Gryffindor of late—stranger than usual, anyway. Having friends in each helped there, she supposed, yet not enough to tell her what had happened to bring it on. Morganna was her first real clue, and even that usually cheerful and talkative person was being tight-lipped. Jenni was left to put the pieces together herself. She was determined to do it here and now, if possible.

First, who was involved? Not Morganna, of course, or she wouldn't need Jenni's help to pry information out of Severus. By the same token, Severus was obviously at the heart of it. James and Sirius were probably there, as well—no, Jenni amended, not James, though it was hard to say why. Perhaps because no one was gloating, and James was infamous for gloating. Sirius, on the other hand, sulked almost as hard as Severus when he thought no one was looking. As for the other Marauders, Pettigrew was almost certainly an accomplice (it seemed to be his lot in life), and Remus... Remus was clearly depressed, and that was probably the strangest piece of the puzzle. Remus Lupin always seemed so stoically happy, no matter what happened to him. What could make him that upset?

Well, that was the question, wasn't it? At least this much was clear: it had to be something huge, something so important that no one was speaking openly about it even though it had Severus smoldering, Sirius sulking, and Remus trying his damnedest not to exist at all.

_It's odd,_ Jenni thought, her chin resting on her folded hands and her brows knitted in concentration. It was odd, and maybe oddness was all it was, but she didn't think so. Intuition (and she would admit a desire for intrigue, also), told her there was some deep, dark secret at work. It worried her. Remus worried her.

That decided it. Morganna could plumb Severus' depths, and Jenni thought her little scheme was likely to make him open up. She, Jennifer Robinson, would approach Remus at the next opportunity.

It came after dinner. In accord with their near-manic display of "normalcy," James and Sirius with Peter at their heels leapt up from the table and waved for Remus to join them. He smiled wanly, but apparently declined. They tried to drag him along anyway, of course, but he was insistent. The three bounded away while the one lingered, prodding his plate wearily. Several Gryffindor girls, Lily included, came and went with their worries for him while Jenni watched from the far end of the Ravenclaw table. Some of her friends and Ame actually came up to her in much the same manner in the meantime, though she had tried to be discreet with her attention. She didn't suppose that Ame was at all fooled by whatever she said to put her off, but Jenni was left to it just the same.

Finally the crowds dissipated and Remus got up. Jenni saw this out of the corner of her eye and made haste to follow. She caught up with him just outside the great doors.

"Remus," she called softly over his shoulder.

He turned, paused, and continued walking as he responded. "Jenni. Hi." As he had done with the others, he tried to smile. It failed to disguise the hollowness about his cheeks and eyes.

Jenni couldn't keep the concern out of her expression, but she went on as rehearsed:

"Hi. I was just thinking we haven't talked in a while. So... how're things?" A straight-forward question for a straight-forward person.

Remus sighed and looked askance at her, almost as if to say, 'I suppose I should have expected this from you, too.'

"Well, they could be worse, I guess, but that's always true. How about yourself?"

"Could be better," Jenni replied with a half-smile. _Touché, Remus._ "No one I know will be in detention once Sirius gets off, provided nothing happens in the meantime, and no one's failing classes that I'm aware of. I know a few people who might do with some cheering, though."

She stopped there, though a hundred ways to expand the thought presented themselves. It happened a lot: speech failed due to a plethora of ideas rather than a shortage.

Remus didn't respond for a moment. When he did, he spoke his scattered thoughts very deliberately and looked Jenni in the face. They were obliged to pause on the first floor landing.

"Jenni... I can see where this is heading. Listen: I like you. I appreciate what you'd try to do.

"Listen: I don't know what you think you know, but whatever I'm going through is private. It's something I have to work through on my own, understand?"

For a moment she didn't. She searched his face and was truly surprised to find that his tired, tawny eyes held the same message as his words. Frankly, the whole encounter was surprising and confusing in that she had expected it to take longer to come to the point at all.

"Ah—"she stammered. "I know we're not the best of friends, but—"

"It's not like that," he cut her off gently, hands raised. "I said I like you. I know you mean well. It's just..." he looked down as though what he had to say next pained him. "I wouldn't ask anyone to trust me, but please believe that it's best this way. Please don't ask. I've said the same thing to everyone else and I'll keep saying it. Will you respect that?"

Now he looked up again and Jenni saw that he was serious. Sad, but completely serious.

"Remus..." Again she stalled with too much output struggling for priority. She considered momentarily how she might break through Remus' shell, but his expression never changed as she looked at him. He was giving nothing away. Finally she sighed. "You know the difference between a good secret and a bad secret, right?" she challenged without force.

Something flickered in his eyes. He drew himself up, not in offense, but to distance himself.

"O, yes," he said hollowly. "Yes, I know all about that."

There was a long silence before he continued. Jenni would have pressed the matter if he hadn't spoken just when and how he did. She was rightly convinced that something was seriously wrong and having trouble consigning herself to uninquisitiveness. However, Remus seemed to decide the conversation was over and took matters firmly into his own hands.

"Good or bad, it's nothing you should worry about, all right? Just forget about it. I'll live, and right now I'm tired. I'm going to bed. I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Okay," Jenni replied sullenly, feeling that giving up didn't suit her one little bit. "Goodnight, Remus."

"Goodnight." He started to walk off, but turned back. "Oh—if I were you, I'd steer clear of the right-hand third floor passage tonight. I'm taking the round-about way myself," he informed her with a ghost of his usual slow smile.

Jenni couldn't help but respond in kind. "Got it," she said. "Thanks. Hey, tell those friends of yours to stay out of trouble, all right?"

"Right. I am supposed to be a prefect, after all." His tone was wry. They both knew that Remus' friends would be likely to keep out of trouble when hell froze over.

Of course, with Voldemort growing in power by the day, who knew?

They said their good-nights again and went their separate ways. Jenni went to sleep feeling rather disappointed, but contented herself knowing that pushing things would probably have done more harm than good. _Remus isn't hiding anything from himself,_ she thought. _Just everyone else._ She would trust that he had his reasons. She just hoped Morganna was having better luck with Severus and that someone would eventually tell her what it was all about.

* * *

In fact, Morganna made her attempt some time before Jenni caught up with Lupin. Severus rarely exhibited much appetite and that evening was no exception. He went down to the common room early and was there, working away, when Morganna approached him. She made sure she was facing him this time. 

She swallowed hard when she saw him, observing the scowl on his face and wondering if that meant the plan was going to work. She still wasn't sure if she wanted it to. She was set to try, though, so she took a deep breath, put on her best determined look, and stepped forward.

"Hey, Severus—"

He glanced up and immediately slapped his quill down. _"No,_ Morganna. I don't want to talk. Leave me alone!"

Morganna stopped short, every nerve in her body insisting that she should obey. Well, that was success, so far, right down to the interruption. She would have to remember to tell Jenni. With that in mind, she steeled herself and proceeded until she was standing just across from Severus.

"Don't give me that," she said. "I just wanted to ask you about this Potions thingy." She held up a sheet of parchment as evidence.

Severus stared, surprised in his turn. None of his dorm mates had given up plaguing him with questions yet, nor had anyone else who had tried talking to him outside of class, for that matter. Yet there stood Morganna Montaque with a hurt and otherwise perfectly guileless expression on her porcelain face.

Well, almost perfectly. His face fell. "You're lying," he informed her tonelessly. Morganna never had been a very good liar. He would have been disappointed, but it was a rare emotion that was strong enough to overcome the roiling curtain of bitter hate inside him. He could almost feel 'disappointment' being caught and strangled in its folds.

"I am," Morganna admitted. This, too, was part of the plan, whatever words she used to carry it off. "But since you've bitten my head off for no good reason now, I think you'd better talk to me."

Laying the piece of parchment aside, she pulled out a chair and seated herself without waiting for an invitation. She regarded him openly, taking in everything about his appearance. He looked right back, bloodless lips pressed stubbornly together. She had him in a corner, but he was not going to admit it.

"Come on, Sevvy," she implored with a note of desperation. She was improvising now. "You know you can talk to me, right? I wouldn't tell anybody."

He looked down and muttered something Morganna couldn't make out.

"All right..." she swallowed again, lowered her voice. "I know you're sworn to secrecy. The truth... the truth is that Lily made James tell, and she told me," she confessed.

Severus' head snapped up. "Oh, well, you seem well informed enough, then." He narrowed his eyes malevolently at her. "Why don't you go ask Potter? I'm sure he'll be _glad_ to tell you all about it. He'll be _glad_ to tell you how he saved the day with so much bravado and at great personal risk! Of course, I'm not allowed to mention that Black... Or that Lupin could... Why don't you go ask Potter?" he repeated. "He'll be glad to tell you his story, and good luck finding any truth in it!"

By this time he was glaring like he might set something on fire with his eyes—in this case, Morganna's head. When he realized it, he quickly looked away again. None of it was her fault. She didn't deserve to see the demon gnawing at his innards.

She had seen, though, and she felt her friend's pain. It was a moment before she spoke quietly:

"Well... anyone with a brain knows that James is a prat. Is it so unbelievable, then, that I should want your side of the story?"

Severus didn't reply, but he raised his eyes to hers. He was suddenly reminded very strongly of his mother. The look on her beautiful face, the accent... Angele Snape had been French, too. She had been warm-hearted and quiet, a loving mother, a perfect wife. She had been full of life. She was none of it, now. Both Severus' parents were dead. _She_ was murdered. _He_ was hanged.

Morganna, now. How dare she? It wasn't the first time he'd asked himself this: how did she dare to be like _her?_ It wasn't fair. None of this was fair.

"Sevvy?" she queried tremulously, bringing him out of himself. "Severus?" She was so worried about him.

"I can't," he said. "I swore. I'm honor-bound, even if Potter thinks he's too good for such things. I'm not. I won't break my word any more than I already have for you. Go to bed, Morganna. You look pale."

There was a general pause. He stood up, but she remained seated, looking up at him with her cerulean eyes.

"Goodnight, Morganna," he said stiffly and turned away. They were both mildly surprised to note that there were other people in the common room, some of whom had been observing their conversation. Shameless Slytherins. Not all of them, of course, but most of them. They turned away when Severus got up and went to his dorm, pretending that nothing had transpired.

Morganna was glad of it. She needed time to herself. The encounter had left her pale and shaking, but not with empathy. She realized now that the burning she had felt before was the onset of one of her tremor attacks.

As soon as she felt sure that no one was watching her, she stood up and headed for her own dorm. She noticed that Severus had left his homework behind and thought about picking it up for him, but decided that he'd probably come back for it later and he wouldn't like to find it missing. She left her blank piece of parchment there, too.

Sassy Bishop and Marguerite Tempscire were chatting animatedly about boys when Morganna entered the room. Normally she would have joined in the gossip, but she crawled into her bed and drew the curtains of the four-poster with hardly a smile to put her roommates off asking questions. They didn't know the true nature of her troubles and they weren't going to find out now. Let them whisper and wonder what it was all about.

After a while, Morganna had to smile in between bouts of pain. The plan had worked, hadn't it? It hadn't been so bad, either. She had not learned as much as she'd wanted to, but at least Severus had admitted something had happened. Moreover, she felt the encounter had ultimately deepened their relationship, and that was something to be glad about! When she fell asleep it was with happy fantasies about the future.

What she did not know was that Severus' books got back to him by the hands of one of the less discreet observers in the common room. She was Akira Basiatos, a girl in Severus' year. She seemed to have a sixth sense for trouble. It attracted her like the proverbial vulture to carrion. Morganna also didn't know that she had associated off and on with Severus ever since their third year and was, in fact, the same dark red-head girl Jenni had seen with him in the midst of a Gryffindor snow war that January.

No one slept easily that night, no matter his or her mood upon falling asleep. A pall hung over the castle.

_Morganna thanked me for helping her with Severus. The plan worked well, she said. She never told me what it was about, and I forgot all about it in the events of the next few weeks._


	11. Part Ten: Reality

**Part Ten – Reality**

In the morning, the cause of last night's unease was revealed as the murder of an old Berkshire couple by Death Eaters. The man was a Daily Prophet columnist who had been particularly outspoken in his pro-Muggle, anti-Voldemort opinions, being a well-known Muggle-born himself. He and his wife had paid for it. They got only small mentions on the front page and in the obituaries.

The students of Hogwarts carried on as well as they could. Whispers of "that's twenty-four," and "who will be next?" permeated the halls, wreaking havoc among the fifth and seventh years in particular, especially those with Muggle parentage. Words like "mudblood" were circulating, also. It was safer to travel in groups these days if you wanted to avoid fanatic purebloods.

The Gryffindor/Slytherin rivalry escalated into all-out war that day in the Great Hall. Lucius made the mistake (or perhaps he had done it on purpose) of insulting Lily's family in James' hearing. James immediately took offense on her behalf and demanded an apology. Naturally Lucius denied that he had done anything wrong. A crowd of supporters began to gather on both sides.

Lily insisted that it wasn't worth the fight, but James ignored her and shoved Lucius into near-by Severus. Evan Rosier shoved James back. Sirius went after him. Lucius stood away and Severus took the opportunity to curse James prior to removing himself from the room, initiating all-around magic dueling before anyone could intervene. The Slytherins had the upper hand as far as spell repertoire went. The Gryffindors were superior in numbers, having popularity in other houses on their side. Spells and food flew wantonly through the air, making the whole scene look like a Jackson Pollock painting. By the time the teachers got it under control, there was hardly a student in the hall who didn't have spots or jelly-legs or the like. Most had been hit with comestible projectiles, and a few were seriously hurt. Lucius was suspiciously unscathed and infuriatingly smug about it.

The whole school received a lecture from Professor Dumbledore and orders to help return people to normal and manually clean the Great Hall. Slytherin and Gryffindor each lost two hundred house points; Ravenclaw suffered for fifty. (Jenni regarded herself and her house as damage control, restricting themselves to body-binding to prevent people from casting serious hexes, and resented the points.) Hufflepuff actually gained seventy points for staying out of the fighting for the most part and yet being most willing to pitch in afterwards, putting them in the lead for the House Cup. Ame Robinson personally earned twenty of them, making her a minor celebrity among friends and allies. Silvanus Trovillion kissed her hand afters she cured him of the _Furnunculus_ curse. She blushed all the rest of that day and most of the next one.

If anyone thought mass punishment would put a stop to the hostilities, they were mistaken. Most of the ringleaders felt they owed revenge upon the other side for one thing or another and the groupies and cronies were quite willing to help out. Skirmishes broke out in the halls periodically for the next couple of days, despite the efforts of prefects (sans Remus, who carefully kept out of it) and teachers alike.

Severus was responsible for more than his fair share of mayhem. Though the fire in him had subsided after talking to Morganna, the embers were hot enough that the slightest provocation caused them to flare up. Lucius encouraged him to take vengeance, reassuring him that he was perfectly justified and that anyone who said otherwise was stupid or weak. This was why they were friends, of course. They allowed each other to feed his dark side, even with little or know knowledge of what cause the other had to hunger. Severus chose to ignore the fact that he was also fighting Lucius' battles for him while Lucius kept his hands clean.

Lily saw it, though. She caught him in the act of tormenting a Gryffindor first year while Lucius hovered in the shadows. It didn't take her long to put two and two together. Before she remembered she wasn't speaking to Severus, she confronted him.

"Severus Snape!"

Severus froze, then straightened and faced the prefect. The first year scampered away without hesitation. Lucius vanished.

"I swear, you are the absolute end! Don't you see what you're doing? How can you be as smart as you are and not see?"

Severus was impassive. "Are you going to report me, Evans? If so, you'd better do it."

"I don't want _you._ I'd much rather have your friend Malfoy, but how can I catch him if you do all his dirty work? That's what you're doing. This isn't your fight and we both know it."

She stood before him, arms akimbo, eyes alight with indignant fire. This wasn't the laughing Lily who threatened his hair with pigtails and scissors when he did something to irk her. This was a grown-up Lily. Strong Lily. Courageous Lily. Lily the mudblood.

"I don't need a lecture from you, Evans. If you're reporting me, hurry up and do it so we can get back to our lives."

"You're not listening! Oh, but when did you ever listen to anyone except yourself? I was forgetting what a conceited, self-serving prick you are. Maybe I will report you. I'd be within my rights."

All true, of course; but Severus retaliated with some truths of his own.

"Oh, that's right. You're a _prefect._" His lip curled around the word. "I suppose that gives you the right to threaten and insult me, even if you are nothing but a mudblood with delusions of grandeur. But let me tell you something." His voice dropped as he leaned over her. "The only reason you care at all is because you're guilty. You and your kind are in the middle of this stupid war, so on some level it's your fault."

Lily staggered back. Her eyes were wide, but her mouth pressed into a short, firm line. Before Severus realized his danger, she hauled off and slapped him.

"Maybe that will knock some sense into you," she said. Without another word she turned and walked away.

"Where are you going?" Severus demanded, his hand pressed to his stinging cheek.

"I'm going for a goddamned swim!"

Which was exactly what she did. Severus hadn't taken her seriously when she said it—he couldn't believe she had hit him, either—but soon people were rushing through the halls to get down to the lake. Severus snagged a small Hufflepuff by the neck of his robes.

"What in God's name is going on now?"

The student quailed as he answered. "Somebody's in the lake! Swimming! Let me go!"

Severus swore under his breath and did so, then made his own way to the castle grounds. There was quite a crowd gathered to see the spectacle, but at a safe distance. It was as if they feared such madness was catching, and perhaps it was. There was more than one person in the water. The ringleader was obviously Lily Evans, but she had been joined by several other students. Most of them were in Gryffindor by the robes they wore with two or three from Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. They were protesting.

_"One, two, three, four, we won't come out 'till you stop this war!"_ they chanted.

Lily must be turning blue by now, Severus thought. Why weren't the teachers putting a stop to this? He looked around and saw Dumbledore, Madam Pomfrey and a few others standing behind the students and watching with strange looks on their faces, at once grim and hopeful. Severus would have understood if he'd stopped to think about it, but he chalked it up as one more score against the competence of the faculty and pushed through to the front of the crowd.

There was one cluster of people between the student mass and the water. Severus was surprised to realize that he knew every face in it. Morganna, Lupin, Potter, and the Robinson twins, Jenni and Ame. As Severus walked toward them he could make out Potter's voice begging Lily to "stop acting insane and come out!" He drew up just behind Morganna and Jenni and looked between them.

"How long?"

"How long, what?" Morganna replied distractedly.

Jenni glanced over her shoulder at him and smiled crookedly, seeming to have a double-take at the group. Ame shied away. Lupin regarded him dourly and Potter either didn't notice him or chose to ignore him.

"How long since this damn fool campaign started?" Severus elaborated.

"I don't know," said Morganna. "We can't get them to come out. It's going to be dark soon, too!" She sounded half worried and half annoyed.

"If the squid hasn't gotten them yet, it probably won't," Jenni offered.

"Bugger the squid. _Evans!"_ Severus bellowed over the chanting and Potter's whine.

_"We won't come out 'till you stop this war!"_ Lily proclaimed, her eyes locked on Severus'.

The cold rage flared. If it hadn't been for Black and Potter, none of this would ever have happened, but now he was being punished for it again.

"Acting like this doesn't make it my fault," he told Lily. "What does it prove if you catch pneumonia or something, huh? What good does it do?"

Lily paused in her chant to launch a response this time. "Are you feeling guilty now, Severus? Well, you should! You're just as bad, James, so you can save your breath for peaceful negotiations if you want me out anytime soon!"

Was that a double entendre? Faugh!

"Come on, Lily!" James cried, missing the hidden meaning. "It's not like I... I mean... come on!"

"Oh, brilliant argument," Severus sneered.

"Like to see you do better, Skivs," James snapped back.

"It's not my problem if you thick-headed Gryffindors don't listen. I'm leaving. I've had enough of this damn circus. Don't drown, Evans! The last thing this place needs is a fucking martyr." The last dissolved into a mumble as Severus turned away. He didn't particularly feel like going to detention over something as stupid as swearing. He felt eyes on his back as he went, but he payed no heed. Nobody could tell him he hadn't tried talking to Lily and no one could accuse him of fraternizing with the enemy, either. His conscience was clear, damnit.

Jenni watched Severus go, intrigued. He was like a black whirlwind, now on the scene, now off. She wondered if he felt the same way inside.

After a while, Madam Pomfrey pushed her way down to the lake and demanded that Lily and the others come up to the hospital wing for warm blankets and doses of Pepper-up Potion.

"Never in all my years have I seen such foolishness on these grounds!" she complained as she ushered her flock of charges away.

Jenni doubted if that was any more true than it was a heartfelt rant. She, Ame, and Morganna trudged along behind them until they were shut out at the infirmary doors. Ame was surprised that she hadn't been admitted, but she leaned against the wall with Morganna and Jenni just the same.

"Well," Jenni said, hoping someone else would pick up the line of dialog. When no one did, she went on. "That was mildly insane."

Morganna nodded mutely.

"Do you think it'll work?" Ame wondered.

"No," Jenni and Morganna answered at the same time. They glanced at one another and snickered nervously.

"It could," Ame argued quietly.

"No," Jenni repeated. "This'll go on for a while and burn itself out slowly. People will forget what it was about and give up. This protesting thing is just fuel on someone's fire." In principle it was a good idea and part of her had wanted to join Lily in the water, but in practice it amounted to so many wet robes in the laundry. Jenni thought it was a waste of energy even as she admired Lily for her nerve.

There was a silence as Ame and Morganna digested Jenni's take on the in-school war. They were all thinking the same thing: _too bad the real war won't work like that._ They shared the thought with the whole school.

"I'm going to go to bed," Morganna said at last. She had meant to wait for Lily, but it didn't look like the protesters were going to be let out of the hospital wing any time soon. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight," Jenni and Ame replied.

* * *

The sun set and rose again with everyone in his or her own bed. The morning was business as usual. It seemed as though Lily's protest had some effect after all. Still, Jenni had a feeling this was just the eye of the storm. Problems would start again in the afternoon. 

Later she wished she had never thought it.

It happened that just as James was preparing to make the next Slytherin pay for driving Lily to stand for hours in the ice-cold lake, someone screamed in Ravenclaw Loft. Jane Nash came running as though Voldemort himself had entered the castle, upsetting James' trick as she blew into the Great Hall.

"Professor Flitwick!" she cried in a breathless sob.

Every head in the Hall turned.

"Professor Flitwick, Professor Dumbledore. Please come quick!" The rest of what she had to say was lost in low volume and the chatter that arose among the students.

At the Ravenclaw table, Jenni turned to Silvanus Trovillion, who shook his head helplessly. What was going on? What had happened? Every second person was asking these questions. The rest were watching the faces of the teachers pale from grave to stricken.

Abruptly, Dumbledore stood up and everyone hushed.

"Everyone will please remain calm. There is no need for alarm. There has been an accident. You will all stay here while we go to investigate it. I repeat, please remain calm."

Dumbledore and Flitwick, tailed by Madam Pomfrey, followed Jane Nash back to the Loft. What they found there, the school later learned, was Sylvia Blackridge. She was dead.

No one ever learned the details, either because they were too grisly or because even the teachers didn't completely understand what had happened. All the students knew for certain was that Sylvia killed herself. The best guess, contributed by Silvanus and Jenni, was that Sylvia's parents were Muggles who didn't support witchery beyond getting their daughter off their hands for nine months out of the year. Between that, Voldemort's campaign against Muggle-borns, O.W.L.'s and the hostilities at school, Sylvia's mind snapped.

The house fighting stopped dead in its tracks. Class was canceled for the rest of the week in exchange for two general assemblies and a series of year meetings. The fifth year Ravenclaws met at 4:00 in the afternoon on Friday. There was a long talk about self-esteem, and at the end everyone was asked to fill out a printed sheet of parchment. Jenni's looked like this:

**Name:** Jennifer Robinson

**House:** Ravenclaw

_Fill out questions as honestly as you can. Attempt to fill all questions in. Hand this in to your Head of House._

_**Open Questions **(extended response)_

**I feel happy when:** I know what I'm doing.

**I feel sad when:** People are ignorant.

**I get angry when:** I mess up and people get hurt.

**More than anything I wish:** I could have stopped her.

**I am afraid that:** I can't (answer this question).

**I look forward to:** Getting out of this meeting.

**I hope I never:** Let my friends down again.

**If I could change one thing about myself it would be:** ...

**One problem I have:** Taking things too seriously/not seriously enough.

**One strength I have:** Seeing people.

**Right now I feel:** Blind.

_**Closed Questions** (yes or no)_

**Are you easily hurt by criticism:** No

**Are you very shy or overly aggressive:** No

**Do you try to hide your feelings:** N Yes

**Do you fear close relationships:** No

**Do you try to blame others for your mistakes:** NO

**Are you glad when others fall:** No

**Any comments you would like to add:** This is dumb. You can't tell what's in someone's head based on words on a sheet. Even if they're honest.

She handed it in and went to sit on her bed, staring at the empty one Sylvia used to occupy. She didn't just feel blind. She felt sick and stupid and alone. Ame would be going to the Hufflepuff meeting now. There was no one around she felt like talking to. She was the only one not avoiding the dorm. The only one with the guts to remember Sylvia and wonder when she had given up. The only one who should have seen ahead of time but had not.

She didn't know when she had fallen asleep, but her pillow was bone-dry when she woke. It worried her. Any decent person ought to have cried herself to sleep.

She saw Morganna, Severus, and Lily again on Sunday evening, after the second and final school assembly was over. This was the last free time before class resumed on Monday, so there were many groups gathered to commiserate. Theirs was in the library, by the windows at the back. Ame was there, also. None of them could have said what force had drawn them all to this one place, and no one mentioned it. They looked at each other and understood.

"I'm glad you made up," Jenni said at last to Lily and Severus.

Severus just grunted and Lily shrugged.

"It was a stupid fight, anyway," she said. "Totally beneath us. We've talked."

"It's silly to let other people's beliefs mess with a good friendship," Morganna agreed. "You are all my friends. Nothing will ever change that."

Severus was the only one who didn't smile.

"Come on, Sevvy," Morganna said. "I'm going to decide you need a hug if you don't cheer up soon."

Severus looked mildly alarmed. "Don't call me that."

It was such a normal exchange that everyone sans Severus broke down in giggles, Ame following the others' lead. Lily started to cry.

"What a horrible, horrible couple of weeks it's been," she said through sniffling laughter. "Look at me!"

"You're a mess," Severus observed helpfully. The corner of his mouth twitched.

Morganna gave Lily a hug and they laughed and wept into each other's shoulder. Tears rolled silently down Ame's cheeks as she watched. Severus and Jenni exchanged dry, "well, what are we supposed to do anyway?" looks. It was strange to have that in common, Jenni thought. Strange, but good, too.

There was a silence, save for the occasional giggle or sniff.

"So. Back to class tomorrow," Ame said, speaking up for the first time.

"I'm looking forward to it." Lily was firm. "I know people needed some down time, but too much is just as bad as not enough."

Jenni nodded. "That's true."

"We still have O.W.L.'s coming up," Ame seemed to finish her thought, even though Jenni had hardly worried about the exams at all. Still, Ame got a supporting nod from Morganna.

"They're not so bad," Lily said reassuringly. "If you're doing well in your classes you shouldn't have a problem raking in ten or more."

Severus huffed. "I got thirteen and I had to work my arse off for them."

"He's lying. He would have gotten twenty if he'd spent less time goofing off," Lily informed the others. They grinned nervously.

"I would have studied more if you hadn't distracted me all the time," Severus replied. "It'll be partly your fault if I fail the N.E.W.T.'s next year, too."

"Stop trying to pin your work-o-phobia on me."

"I thought we were saving him from being a work-a-holic," Morganna put in.

"Oh, yes." Lily grinned now.

Severus rolled his eyes. He was clearly not at all amused by the banter at his expense.

"Come _on,_ Severus!" Lily playfully shoved his arm. "Where is your sense of humor?"

"Gee, I don't know," Severus snapped. "Maybe I left it outside. Maybe I'll go find it." He whirled away from them. A few minutes later he was visible as a mobile shadow in the courtyard below the library windows.

"I guess he's still upset over _that,"_ Lily said quietly to Morganna. "I'd almost forgotten about it in the light of the house war."

As Morganna nodded, Jenni moved closer to the window and peered down.

"I think I'll go after him," she said. "If... no one minds, that is." She looked at Morganna, on whose toes she was most likely to be stepping.

Morganna waved her concern away lightly. "No, go ahead. I'll see you later, Jenni." She smiled like the bloom of summer.

Jenni smiled back. She didn't feel it, but she couldn't help it. "Okay. I just feel like I want some air, you know? See you." She waved to the three and walked after Severus.

It was strange how suddenly she had felt like an outsider with Morganna and Lily, and even Ame, who couldn't have known what they were talking about any more than Jenni did. She just had to leave, and it seemed like Severus had the best destination in mind. No one else would be in the courtyard this close to curfew.

She saw him before he was aware of her, as she slid around a corner of stone. He stood like a tall black statue, staring off into some distant netherworld. It was a moment before Jenni found the heart to disturb him.

"Severus?"

He turned and there was a small flash as his eyes pierced the darkness to find her. Still, she got the impression he didn't quite see her and only knew her by the sound of her voice.

"Jenni?"

She felt a flush. He had used her short name, like a friend.

"Yeah. You don't mind if I...?" She had meant to say, "You don't mind if I'm here, do you?" but that changed mid-sentence as she detached herself from the wall and stepped toward him.

"No," he said after a pause. "It's fine."

She came to stand five feet to his right and followed the tilt of his chin to the waning crescent moon riding over the castle walls. She couldn't fathom his true thoughts then, so she took a shot in the dark.

"So. Those meetings were a real waste of time, huh? Those worksheets."

Severus agreed. "As if they actually cared. I didn't turn mine in."

"What did you do with it?" Jenni half-chuckled, looking at him.

"I don't remember." He shrugged, looking down and around to Jenni. He didn't say anything, just studied her.

Her thoughts brewed uncomfortably in her head. She kept imagining what Severus would say and how she would try to respond—never well enough. Eventually she couldn't take it and looked away.

"So... what exactly happened between you and Lily?" she asked.

"Oh. She didn't tell you?"

"No. She might have used the words 'stupid git.'"

"Hm. Lily thinks she knows what's best for everyone."

"You don't agree?"

"She doesn't know me as well as she thinks."

"I see." A pause. "Does anyone know you?"

He responded with silence.

"I knew her," Jenni confessed softly to the night.

"Hm?"

She had no concept of why she was doing this, but she understood it was what she had come here to do. She went on.

"The girl. Sylvia. I knew her. I met her on the train my first year and she was in my dorm. We were friends for a while, but we grew apart. I never thought she was that upset, or I would have said something." She became aware that her voice was fragmenting every other word. Something crawled down her cheek. She reached up to brush it away and was startled when her hand came away wet. She laughed quietly as her cheeks heated with embarrassment. "Now I cry. I was beginning to think I wasn't going to."

"Well, don't," Severus' cool voice sidled through the night air. "It isn't as though it matters. If someone wants to die, they'll find a way."

"I know," she said. "I can't help thinking 'could'a, would'a, should'a,' though."

Severus shrugged as if resettling his shoulders to free himself of some irritant. "That won't change anything."

The pause that followed that statement dragged on for a full minute. Jenni sniffed sullenly and turned slightly away, sparing Severus any sight of her face. Though she couldn't see him now, she could sense him as he shifted uncomfortably, rocking onto the ball of one foot and back again, then turning to look steadily at the back of her neck. Presently, he spoke again.

"Are you still crying?"

"Yes."

"Hm."

There was a moment of suspended time, and Jenni felt a warm presence on her left and an arm around her shoulders. She stiffened momentarily and so did the presence. Then she sighed in profound relief and leaned into Severus' side. How could anyone ever think him cold when he was so warm? His fingers closed firmly around her deltoid muscle and she felt secure in his grip. She had never had a big brother, but this was what it must be like.

A small horror struck her.

"I'm going to get your robes wet."

She felt the rumble in his chest as he replied:

"So stop crying."

She laughed with her mouth closed.

"Severus?"

"Hm?"

"Thank you."

_I never quite recovered from Sylvia's death. Part of me remained convinced there was something I could have done. As for Severus, he understood that, and I think he was flattered to have someone confide in him, whatever he said about it._


	12. Part Eleven: Madness

**Part Eleven – Madness**

What the hell had he been thinking?

Severus was looking at Professor Slughorn's chalkboard, but he wasn't seeing the instructions for the day's potion. He was conscious of Lucius on his right and Aeolus at the cauldron to his left, but he was more worried about Lily on the other side of the room. It was a good job Morganna wasn't in this class, or he would have been paralyzed from the neck up.

What the hell had he been thinking? He didn't like Robinson that much—hardly at all, really. He tolerated her the way he tolerated all Morganna's little girlfriends. It would be difficult to care less.

For that matter, what the hell had she been thinking? He had never shown her anything but cool, limited tolerance, yet she had chosen to air her doubts to him. He hadn't meant to comfort her. He hated crying girls. She should have run off to find someone more sympathetic after his first response, but she had simply accepted it. That wasn't normal, dammit. So, he panicked and did the first thing he thought of to make the situation end, but why _that?_ He should have just walked away.

_Could'a, would'a, should'a._ Jenni's words popped into his thoughts.

_But it doesn't change anything. Shit._

He would just have to make sure she knew he wanted nothing to do with her the next time he saw her. Come to think of it, he didn't really want to see anyone. Fortunately, most people were still fairly shell-shocked over the events of two weeks past. Unfortunately—

"Snape!" The sound of his name was accompanied by a sharp jab to his ribs.

Unfortunately, Lucius didn't give a damn what Severus wanted.

"Dammit, Snape, are you listening? How the hell do you julienne the spinal cord of a snake? What kind of stupid word is julienne?"

Severus sighed and pulled the worm-like bit of nervous tissue toward himself, then picked up the fine paring knife they had been issued for this class.

"Aren't you lucky I don't need to pay attention to know what I'm doing." It wasn't a question. "You grind the cloves and I'll show you how to julienne the spinal cord of an _asp._"

Lucius made a rude face, but poured a measure of fresh cloves into his mortar and set to with the pestle.

Lucius had his talents, but subtlety wasn't one of them. He was too impatient to make the thin strips thin enough, or uniform. Severus happened to know that that for this particular potion, it was absolutely crucial to do exactly as the directions dictated, or one got something much deadlier than intended. He had learned about it from his guardian and tutor two summers ago. It turned a noxious shade of purple when it was done correctly, and worked just as well through skin contact as through ingestion. (Severus also knew that it tasted like bad crème de menthe. He hadn't been able to feel his tongue for six hours after sensation returned to the rest of his body.)

The class worked in silence which was only interrupted by the occasional monosyllabic admonition and a few giggles from the cauldron at which Potter and Black were working.

"Galleon says they nick some," Lucius whispered out the side of his mouth.

Severus rolled his eyes. He didn't need to comment; of course they would, and he would keep his eyes open in hope of catching them at it. The more time those idiots spent in detention, the better.

"Some things never change." Lucius dumped his powdered cloves into the cauldron. "Don't you wish they could, though?"

His tone was entirely too casual for Severus' liking.

"What are you muttering about, Malfoy?"

"What if I told you there was a way to end it all?"

Severus looked up with one eyebrow arched in contempt. "Let's see. There's poison, of course, and drowning; cursing one's self; I hear hanging is a lovely way to go if you want that dramatic flair..." he trailed off as Slughorn wandered past, flapping his jaw at them. Severus lowered his gaze until the professor was gone, then glared at Lucius. "Say what you mean, Malfoy, or shut up."

Lucius only shrugged. "Later."

Severus didn't press. He turned back to the potion and saw it through the final stages of brewing. He ignored Slughorn's usual cooing over Lily (disgusting, really). He cast surreptitious glances in the direction of Potter and Black, who appeared to clean up in all innocence. He thought about what Lucius had said.

A way to end it all. All what? All the favoritism, all the hypocrisy, all the scraping for favor in a system never designed to appreciate one's more unique characteristics... End the system? _For your next vacation, why not visit Anarchy? Lovely this time of year, smashing accommodations with all the comforts, provided you get there first._ Ugh. Dirty socks in every trunk. No, there had to be some kind of system. Lucius Malfoy, Minister of Magic? Could that be his solution? Lucius was certainly ambitious enough.

Leaving the dungeon, lost in contemplation of that horror, Severus almost didn't see the water balloon. A flicker of motion caught his eye just in time to side-step so that the thing exploded on the stairs, splashing purple slime across an impressive radius. The air filled with the sharp scent of cloves de menthe. Severus whirled and found that he was alone in the corridor with Black and Potter.

"That's the last time I let you throw, mate," said Black. "Here, I'll show you how it's done!" On the word "done," he lobbed a second balloon at Severus.

But Severus was ready. "_Windardium Leviosa!_" Without bothering to draw his wand, he caught the balloon mid-arc with the charm and sent it right back where it had come from. He couldn't have planned it better: Potter moved reflexively to catch it, causing the resulting splatter to catch both Gryffindors full across the face. As they stood blinking, Severus bared his teeth in a grin.

"For your sakes, I hope you made that properly," he said. "If you're lucky it'll only numb your sense of touch. If not, well, I hope you enjoy the scent of cloves, because it'll be the last thing you experience before your lungs seize up."

Potter glared. "Broh ighth outh er ahh..." He stopped and carefully probed his mouth. "Ah cramd phreel bah ribps... doh theeph... doh thongh."

"Shdirr breevin', though," Black said defiantly.

"Pity," said Severus. He made sure to enunciate precisely. "Still, I expect you'll make your own way to the hospital wing. Mind the stairs when your legs stop working."

With that, he left them. It was only a small triumph in the face of years of abuse, but he'd take it. The high was just about worth the nasty, creeping feeling he got when he came down again—the feeling of the knowledge that no one gave a bloody damn, nor would even if they had witnessed the incident. Well, he, Severus, gave a damn, and his execution of the simple wandless charm had been flawless, the results perfect. As far as magic was concerned, he could spell circles around any two sixth or seventh years (with the possible exception of Lily Evans, if only because she was that quick). That was fine. What bothered him, he decided as he entered the library; the thing that gnawed persistently on the rope of his sanity was the fact that no matter how hard he tried or what he achieved, there would always be some bastard standing over him with a grin on his face and a rod in his hand, saying "that's all you have to show for yourself, boy?"

And then the blows would fall.

And her tears.

"_Bastard._"

"Sevvy?"

He blinked and found himself between bookcases with his fists balled at his sides, his fingernails on the point of cutting into his palms. The voice that had interrupted his thought process had to be associated with the pair of blue eyes peering up at him. He forced himself to relax.

"Morganna."

She was sitting there with one big old book open to one side of the parchment before her, quill poised over an incomplete sentence. She looked very small and fragile among the towering shelves and great, dusty tomes, like a hummingbird at Stonehenge.

"I'm sure you didn't mean me...?" she queried in a small voice.

"Of course not," said Severus, making a show of examining the fingernails of his left hand. "By all accounts, your breeding is immaculate."

It was—both of her parents were very influential wizards in Paris. Morganna only shrugged and smiled.

"So, who's the bastard?" she asked a moment later. "Malfoy?"

"A likely prospect, but no. Inbred, yes. Bastard, no; not in the literal sense, anyway."

Morganna grinned. "I knew he was inbred. But if he's not the bastard, then who?"

On the surface, she was simply enjoying the banter. Dragging Malfoy's name through the mud was always fun. In truth, she wanted to know the name of the moron who had upset her Sevvy so that she could make said moron's life miserable at the best opportunity. Her revenge might not be swift, but it would be sure.

Severus realized this. Now it was his turn to shrug. "No one you know. No one of consequence." He couldn't keep his lip from curling on the last word, inappropriate in more than one way. Irony was beautiful.

Before Morganna could ask another question, he went on: "What are you doing here, anyway?"

"Studying," she answered, making a little moue. (Severus sometimes wondered if she practiced in front of a mirror. She didn't have to—she had perfected the art at the age of six.) "It's this plant, I don't quite understand when it should be picked and the Professor hinted strongly that it might be on the O.W.L. test. And I was going to meet Cissy here," she added, "but I suppose Lucius found her first."

They both knew what that meant, and the both pulled faces to show what they wanted each other to think they thought about the couple's behavior. In public, no less. With sound effects. Ew.

Severus and Morganna both suddenly became very interested in Morganna's herbology book.

"Black Lotus," Severus observed. "One of the most toxic plants known to wizardry."

"We're not handling any, of course."

"Of course. What's the problem?"

"Well, I understand about the season and the moon phase, and naturally it only blooms at night, but how am I supposed to tell if it's six years old?"

Severus sighed. "Honestly, Morganna, what do you do in class?"

"I was paying attention!"

"Hush, or you'll bring the hag down on us; and you can't have been. Surely Professor Sprout mentioned that Black Lotus blooms once every three years."

"Yes, but—"

"And that the rate of growth is... blast, what is it?"

"Yes—"

"Well, never mind. The point is, it's really quite simple, because—"

"But, Sevvy—"

"I really wish you would stop calling me that. It's childish."

"Severus!"

"For god's sake, what?"

Morganna decided she was very patient. "First," she said, "it doesn't say anywhere that all Black Lotuses have to start the same size. Second, if you turn around right now you might get to see an inbred freak die of not laughing."

She pointed. Severus turned and, sure enough, there was Lucius Malfoy holding his sides and quaking with silent mirth. Narcissa, standing behind Lucius, shrugged helplessly. Severus flushed and scowled.

"If you pass out I'll tie your cravat to your shoelaces and leave you on your stomach to choke, so I suggest you control yourself."

Lucius sniggered. "Yes, sir... Professor Snape, sir..." He showed no signs of calming down.

Morganna sat up and smiled. "'Professor' Snape? I like that..."

"You're no help," snapped Severus, who did not appreciate being laughed at under any circumstances. Worse, the reference threw his mind back to the night he and his dorm mates sat around plotting to discover Remus Lupin's secret. It hadn't happened so very long ago, that adventure under the Whomping Willow, but it felt like an ancient nightmare that wouldn't stop haunting him. Every time he thought he had let it go—bottled it up and moved on—something would recall a part of the horrible memory and the whole thing would follow. Of course, none of the others knew this. Morganna hadn't been there, Lucius didn't know what had happened, and the look on Narcissa's face suggested that she was completely out of the loop.

Morganna said something meant to be placating, but Severus had to concentrate on not rearranging Lucius' smirking facial muscles for him. He would not explode. Not here, not in front of the girls. He drew a hissing breath and released it quickly:

"I don't have time for this." He shouldered roughly past Lucius and headed for the door. He practically felt the three unison blinks at his back, and that gave him a little satisfaction.

"Hey!" Lucius' voice. His brain had caught up with his eyes. "Excuse me, ladies... Hey!" He came jogging up alongside Severus to a hail of shushing from Madam Pince. All traces of humor vanished from his voice. "Don't rush off. I still want to talk to you. Anyway, no need to get shirty about a little joke."

"Ever seen your tonsils, Malfoy?"

"Why would I look?"

"Because I'm going to shove your eyeballs down your throat if you don't drop it." Severus' eyes glinted fiercely in the light from the torches along the fourth floor corridor. To himself, in an inspiration, he added a note to send Lucius' middle finger to J. Robinson for suggesting the Professor thing to begin with. Bloody Ravenclaw. Hell, all the other Houses were tits.

Lucius, in a fit of intelligence, or at least survival instinct, kept quiet for some time as well as keeping pace along the passages and stairs. Finally, on the second floor landing, Severus stopped and looked at him.

"All right. What? You seem to think this is important enough to risk internal organs."

The answering grin would have been at home on a feline the other side of a looking-glass.

"It is," said Lucius. "But let's go somewhere a bit quieter." He made bold to take Severus just above the elbow, and led him down the deserted hallway.

* * *

What was it all about? 

That was the question that plagued J. Robinson throughout May and well into June. She moved through her classes as a cornfield, attending to her surroundings enough to get by, but focused on some alluring, indistinct sense of open air ahead. If she could just get out there, she thought, she would be able to make sense of everything.

All around her in the field were figures, some nearer and clearer, some distant and occluded. They moved in and out, sometimes seeming random, sometimes articulating as in the steps of an ancient and complex ritual dance. If she watched carefully, she could once in a while predict when and where the next move would come—but she couldn't see the whole thing or begin to guess at its ultimate conclusion.

Jenni's Divination Professor told her that her inner eye was clouded by the day-to-day trappings of humanity. Professor McGonagall told her to get her head out of the clouds. Her Head of House suggested a lie-down in the hospital wing, some peaceful shut-eye.

Jenni decided the only hope of getting out with her sanity intact was to ignore them completely. In this, she found herself allied again with Severus Snape. She hardly saw him (Morganna told her less than reassuringly that he was avoiding everyone since the incident with Lucius in the library), but on the rare occasions their eyes happened to meet, a clear understanding passed between them: the world was mad.

_To this day, I can only imagine what Lucius said to Severus in that hallway._


	13. Part Twelve: Summer

_**Part Twelve – Summer**_

The crowd recently disembarked from the Hogwarts Express formed solid clumps on Platform 9-3/4, islands in a sea of anxiety. Just that morning, the Daily Prophet had released the details of Voldemort's latest attack: the death toll was up to sixty-three, Aurors and Muggles included. Though it was a rare student who said as much, many were very much afraid that they would never see their friends again. Until their parents and guardians arrived, they stayed close to each other.

Morganna, however, felt that she had nothing to worry about. "You should all come visit me in France this summer," she said to her circle. "You could meet my friends at Beuxbatons, and I could show you Paris. It would be the most wonderful time, away from all this nasty business."

Her hopeful smile faded at the looks she got in response.

"I'd love to, 'Ganna, I really would," Narcissa said. "But Mother would never allow it. Not now."

"Ditto." Jenni spoke for herself and her twin. "We'll be lucky if we aren't packed off to America or Greece or someplace else safe to moulder in." She grimaced.

"It does sound lovely, though," Lily added, laying a hand on Morganna's arm. "We'll write you, of course."

The others nodded and Morganna was somewhat reassured. However, her glance strayed. Adjoining the group of girls was Severus and his posse, speaking in voices too low for her to hear. None of them even looked like they had heard her invitation.

"Oh, them," Lily said. She rolled her eyes. "Not that Gryffindor boys are any better. You could die holding your breath for a letter from any of them. Don't worry about it."

Morganna, embarrassed that Lily had followed her gaze and her train of thought, drew herself up. "I'm not worried. Besides, who can read Severus' hand, anyway?" She pitched the last loudly enough to carry and was rewarded by a brief cold stare. She smiled sweetly in return. Severus' handwriting was perfectly legible when he wanted it to be, of course, but he did have a tendency to scrawl when he was in a hurry.

They all had a chuckle at that, Lucius, Aeolus, and Evan included. Morganna felt a twinge of guilt over making Severus the butt of their entertainment, but the renewed sense of companionship made up for it. As if to illustrate the feeling, Lucius breached the cluster of girls and drew Narcissa into a deep kiss. Morganna added her voice to the unanimous register of disgust.

"Unfortunately," Lucius said when he broke the kiss, "unfortunately, I must now deprive you all of my company."

"Oh, no." Lily feigned a yawn.

Lucius seemed to ignore her, but his tone turned from doleful to sneering. "My beloved father has arrived. I can't say I'll miss you sorry sots," he addressed the boys, "but, Narcissa, dear, I know you won't leave me to languish in my dull, dull quarters all summer, will you?"

"I'll use a different owl every day so as not weary your eyes, darling," she replied with a prim little smile.

Morganna caught Lily and the Robinson twins trading looks. She supposed they wondered what it would be like to have that kind of luxury. But now Lucius was walking away and all eyes turned to him again.

"See you next September, if you're not dead," he called. "And Severus, I'll see you sooner!" With that, he turned away and exited the platform with his father.

After that, it seemed like everyone else vanished at once. Morganna said good-bye to Lily, Aeolus, Severus, Jenni and Ame, and Narcissa. She spent an uncomfortable minute or two with only Evan Rosier for company, but finally her own Aunt Winterburn came and took her away. She wasn't allowed much time to think between the trip to Aunt Winterburn's flat and repacking her things for the journey home, and when she was welcomed into the arms of her mother and sisters she was so pleased to be back that everything dark and unpleasant went clean out of her mind.

* * *

Morganna spent the first couple of weeks reuniting with old friends and doing with them all the things she had planned for her new friends, so she didn't mind the initial dearth of letters from England. She was much too busy re-visiting Paris and she graciously allowed that the others were still reveling in being home, too. When the owls did come, they came in droves:

_June 18, 1976_

_Dear Morganna,_

_ I was right! Can you credit it? Ame and I are stuck here in Beacon Hill for the rest of the summer. There are worse places, I suppose, but we are itching for __magical__ places and Salem is only interesting the first million times. Worse, I'm almost out of reading material. Crisis!_

_I'm glad you're having fun, anyway. Paris sounds much more interesting than stuffy ol' Boston. Do let Ame and me know what you get up to so we can live vicariously through you._

_Cheers!_

_Jenni & Ame_

_June 19, 1976_

_Morganna,_

_ I haven't forgotten that crack about my handwriting. It would appear that you unknowingly cursed me forever. I shan't be writing anymore, so if you can decipher this mess you may pass the word along._

_Incidentally, any charitable donations will go to the reconstruction of my knuckles._

_No thanks at all,_

_S. Snape, ex-piano student_

_June 22, 1976_

_Dear Morganna,_

_ Gosh, Paris sounds good. The climate here is simply ghastly, and I don't mean the heat. Petunia is driving me absolutely mad. I'm almost tempted to take Potter up on his offer to 'abduct' me. Unfortunately, the tone of his letter was not at all wholesome, and I found the condition of the paper rather suspect. Honestly, can you imagine James Potter going back and crossing out all the misspelled words with a red pen? I'm forced to assume someone is being had, and I'm not at all sure it's me. Should I make a reply to 'James,' do you think?_

_Love,_

_Lily_

_P.S. Got your other letter just now. If Snape is playing for sympathy, he's going about it all wrong—he ought to be playing a tiny violin under your window or something. But then, I suppose that requires the use of fingers, too. Oh well!_

_Lily_

_June 24, 1976_

_Morganna darling,_

_ You know you mustn't believe Severus, don't you? Lucius got much the same letter. He showed it to me when I visited, and what a horrible thing it was! It was all gouged and spattered with blood, and yours was clean, or I know you would have mentioned it. He's only being melodramatic._

_Speaking of drama, you won't believe this: it seems my dear cousin Sirius has been disowned. The word is he's run off to live with the wretched Potters. The whole family is in an uproar and my poor aunt is having kittens. It's perfectly dreadful. I am jealous of your family. You make them sound wonderful. Trade?_

_Yours Truly,_

_'Cissa_

_June 29, 1976_

_Morganna --_

_ Forgive my brevity, but I've had an amazing idea and you're the only one I can trust to do something about it. Ever heard of the Protean Charm? If it, or something like it, were applied to several sheets of parchment, you could have a many-way conversation in writing and never weary an owl. All you need to do is find someone to enchant the pages so that they all change when one is written on and send a page to each of our friends. Wouldn't it be fantastic? It would save your hand from cramping, too, because you'd only have to write your message once. Do look into it, won't you? I'm counting on you!_

_In breathless anticipation,_

_Lily_

On the Protean Parchment, over the following weeks:

_July 3, 1976_

_Lily, 'Cissy, Robinsons, Severus --_

_ This is the thing Lily invented. I also sent you her description of how it works. Do write something so I know you got it?_

_Love,_

_Morganna_

_July 3, 1976_

_This is Lily. Morganna, I love you forever! Does it work? Did you test it? Who did the magic so that I might thank them, too? Whee!_

_Lily_

_July 4, 1976_

_Lily,_

_ My brother Gerad did it. He's getting married soon, but he says he always has time for his favorite little sister. Very nice of him, isn't it?_

_Morganna_

_July 5, 1976_

_Jenni here. Brilliant notion, Lily! I can see the messages from you and Morganna, so I guess it works. I don't know why you bothered sending one to Severus, though, Morganna. Didn't you tell us he's refusing to write?_

_Ame wants to know what happens when we come to the end of the parchment. Also, seems a bit silly to sign, once you've already said who's writing._

_... Ame says signing signals the end of a message. I suppose she's right._

_-- Jenni and Ame_

_July 6, 1976_

_Jenni,_

_ I hadn't thought of that. Oops. I suppose someone has to wipe the parchment when it gets full. ... Someone allowed to do magic._

_Morganna, just how nice is this wonderful brother of yours? (If you can imagine me with a wide-eyed, innocent grin, you should get more or less the right effect here.)_

_As for Severus, I only hope he doesn't burn his. I don't know what that would do to ours._

_Lily_

_July 6, 1976_

_It isn't Snape you need worry about. I had to rescue mine from Bella AND Lucius already. This is Narcissa, by the way. Hello._

_'Cissa_

_July 6, 1976_

_Cissy (and everyone), are you SURE you can't come to Paris? I just know you'd love it here. I've already told you about the shops, but there's the country, too, where it's quite lovely this time of year when it isn't beastly hot. You can lie in the sun all day and the servants bring you strawberries and cream, or anything you like. Come for the wedding!_

_Oh, Gerad says he'll clear everything but the last note on the parchment and we can start over from the top. He really is a good brother. He would never snoop, either._

_Morganna_

_July 10, 1976_

_Who spilled tea on their parchment? And, Narcissa, I know EXACTLY how you feel. My sister is always snooping around my stuff._

_Lily_

_July 10, 1976_

_This is Ame. Jenni spilled the tea on herself with the parchment in her pocket. She just got very excited about something for her project. Sorry. I hope everyone is well._

_Ame_

_July 11, 1976_

_No need to be sorry, dear, I was just asking. If it were Severus or someone else's sister, I might have had Words for them, though._

_What project, by the way? If you don't mind me asking._

_Lily_

_July 11, 1976_

_Say, what if someone did steal one of our parchments? Someone who was an enemy? Couldn't that be dangerous?_

_'Cissa_

_July 11, 1976_

_Honestly, Narcissa, don't be paranoid. Who could possibly care about the idle chatter of a few mere schoolgirls?_

_Lily_

_July 11, 1976_

_Honestly, Lily, don't be so naïve. SOME of us aren't 'mere' anything._

_Narcissa_

_July 11, 1976_

_Something we should know about, Narcissa? Go on, I'll listen. Or read, rather. I suppose this is to do with your wonderful boyfriend and his ilk? Well, I'll go on record saying they can get stuffed._

_Lily_

_July 12, 1976_

_If you aren't a mere anything, does that make you a mere something? Or a mere nothing?_

_Incidentally, my project is of a most sensitive nature. If I told you, I'd have to kill you all and burn the evidence. Very hush-hush. I'm sure my enemies would die to know what I know about String Theory. Ooops, did I write that? Blast! I'm terribly sorry, everyone; really this is very embarrassing. I'm afraid I shall have to curse this message. When you read my name, it's all over. Been lovely knowing you all. Good-bye._

_Deepest regrets,_

_Jenni_

_July 12, 1976_

_That isn't funny, Robinson._

_Narcissa_

_July 12, 1976_

_Yes, it was. Brava! I haven't laughed so much since this horrid heat wave set in. String, I ask you. Jolly good._

_Lily_

_July 21, 1976_

_... Er, is everyone all right? I'm sorry about the row. The heat made me irritable, I expect. Narcissa, pax? Morganna? Jenni? Ame?_

_Lily_

_July 22, 1976_

_We're here. Bored, but all right. Haven't heard from Morganna in ages, though. Have you?_

_Jenni and Ame_

_July 23, 1976_

_Oh, I'm sorry, everyone. I didn't mean to make you worry, but I've been having a terrible time. I didn't want to talk about it, but I must tell you. You see... oh, I'm getting tears on the parchment... it's too awful. It began with Mother telling me I must marry Marc Remillard. Cissy, I know you've met him. Well, he's here! I suppose Mother and Father think Gerad's wedding will inspire me, but I just can't! They can't make me do it. I won't let them, and I said so. Father got so angry! I'm the last one, he said, and I ought to take my place. I don't know what that means, but it made Mother cry. I've never seen her cry before. It scares me._

_After that I was ill and I just haven't felt like writing until now. Everything's gotten so tense. I'm living with my sister Lucia now, but I can't wait to go back to Hogwarts. I miss you all dreadfully._

_Anna_

(( Author's Note: Yes, I know I said I wouldn't do this. However, this upload comes at the end of two-year silence, so I think some comment is appropriate. First of all, this chapter is not complete. I just put it up to prove that I'm not dead and neither have I abandoned hope for finishing this story some day, when college coursework stops eating all my free time. Second of all, this website does evil things to my formatting, so if anything looks weird here or in other places, please let me know about it. I actually care about these things.

Thanks for sticking with me all this time.

Neshomeh ))


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